UMAftY 

UWIVW5ITY  OF 
CAWOINIA 
SANTA  CRUZ 


p 


Xtttle  Essays 

in 
literature  an&  %ife 


Xittle 


in 


^Literature  anb  %ife 


IRicbarfc  Burton 

/;) 

PROFESSOR  OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE  IN  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  MINNESOTA,  MEMBER 

THE  NATIONAL  INSTITUTE  OF 

ARTS  AND  LETTERS 


Century  (To, 
1914 


Copyright,  1914,  by 
THE  CENTUBT  Co. 

Published,  March,  2924. 


TO  MY  FRIEND 
WILLIAM  C.  EDGAR 


Contents 

mature 

PAGE 

IMMEMORIAL  FIRES 3 

THE  MIRACLE  CALLED  SPRING 8 

OWNING  THE   EARTH 13 

OUR    ELDER    BROTHERS ig 

THE    IRONY   OF   NATURE 23 

SHORES   OF   OUR   WESTERN    SEA 28 

AGAIN  THE  GOLDEN   WEATHER 33 

fl&an  an&  Society 

A  FIVE-YEAR-OLD 39 

MY    FRIEND    AND    I 44 

OUT   OF  CHILDHOOD 49 

LOAFING 53 

OLD  AGE 58 

THE  LURE  OF  HAPPINESS 63 

AS  OTHERS  SEE  US «     •     •  68 

THE  SOUL  BEHIND .      .  73 

THE  IRONY  OF  SUCCESS .     .  78 

KEEP   ON   WORKING    .     >     ....     .     .     .      .  83 

HEREDITY  AND  CHARACTER  .      .     .     . ,  V'.     .  88 

LIFE  THE  PLAY      .     .     .     ...     .     ,     .     .     .  93 

AN  EPIGRAM'S  VALUE   .     .     ..;*;;';»     .  98 

BENEATH  THE  THRESHOLD 103 

LOCAL   MINDS    .      .     .     .     .     » 108 

FALLING   IN   LOVE      .      ... 113 

NEW  ACQUAINTANCES !l8 

BLUNDERS   AND   BLUNDERERS I23 

GADDING  ABOUT I28 

AND  OTHERS !33 


Contents 

THE  SELFISHNESS   OF  YOUTH   .....     .^38 

CRITICISM  AND   CANT I43 

UNCIVIL   SERVICE I4g 

THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  SOCIETY IS3 

Brt  and  Xetters 

THE  HOLINESS  OF  BEAUTY jfo 

HIDE  AND  SEEK  WITH  ROMANCE  .     .     .     .     .    ^ 
AN  OLD  DICTIONARY:    A  REVERY       ....   171 

BEAUTY  AND  SORROW I77 

ON   BEING   "  NATURAL "      .     .     ...     .     .     .    jg2 

THE  AUTHOR  AS   CITIZEN *&j 

THE  CALIFORNIA  MISSION  PLAY   .     .     .     .     .    I92 

MARK  TWAIN -     •     .      -  •   2OI 

THE  "ANTIGONE"  AT  THE  GREEK  THEATER  209 
THE   MORAL   OBLIGATION   OF   LITERATURE    .   2Ig 
RE-READING  BOOKS   .     „     .     .     .     .     ,     .     .     -223 

SHAW'S  WISDOM   .     .     .     ...     ...     .     .  229 

BOOKS    AND    MEN 234 


THE  BIBLE  IN  THE  SCHOOLS 


239 


THE  DIFFICULTY  OF  TRANSLATION   ....   244 
BOOK  ONE  HUNDRED  ONE     .     .     .     .     .     .     .  249 


TASTE  AND  GENIUS  IN  LETTERS 


254 


THE  POVERTY  OF  POETS   .      .....      .      .   259 

MATTER-OF-FACT    FICTION      .     .     .     .      .     .     .264 

STEVENSON'S    PRAYER-BOOK       .     ....     .     .269 

BARRIE  AND  THE  BARONETCY   ...     .     .     .282 

THE    BROWNINGS 287 

REPUTATION   AND   REWARD   IN   LETTERS 


292 
ST.  AUGUSTINE  AND  BERNARD  SHAW   ...   302 


THE  OLD-FASHIONED  VIEW  OF  ART   .      .      .      .   297 


Education 


THE  "  FEMINIZATION "  OF  CULTURE  -  -  -  309 
CULTURE,  "  CULCHAH  "  AND  COMMON  SENSE  3^ 
VULGARIZING  SPEECH 3IQ 


Contents 

PAGE 

CURRENT   EDUCATIONAL   IDEALS 324 

THOUGHT  AND   ITS   EXPRESSION 329 

facetiae 

CONCERNING    THE    JACKASS 337 

THE  ESSENCE  OF  HUMOR 342 

A    SUPPRESSED    INSTINCT 347 

OF    DARKNESS    AND    LIGHT 352 

Most  of  these  papers  have  appeared  in  the  columns  of 
The  Bellman,  and  my  thanks  are  due  the  editor  and  pro- 
prietor for  the  courteous  permission  to  reprint  them  here- 
with. 


FOREWORD 

The  way  of  the  familiar  essay  is  one,  of  the  formal 
essay  another.  The  latter  is  informational,  it  defines, 
proves;  the  former,  seeking  for  friendlier  and  more 
personal  relations  with  the  reader,  aims  at  suggestion, 
stimulation.  The  familiar  essay  can  be  an  impression- 
istic reflection  of  the  author's  experience  in  the  mighty 
issues  of  living,  or  it  may  be  the  frank  expression  of  a 
mere  whim.  It  should  touch  many  a  deep  thing  in  a 
way  to  quicken  the  sense  of  the  charm,  wonder,  and 
terror  of  the  earth.  The  essayist  can  fly  high,  if  he 
but  have  wings,  and  he  can  dive  deeper  than  any  plum- 
met line  of  the  intellect,  should  it  happen  that  the 
spirit  move  him. 

It  is  thus  the  ambition  of  the  familiar  essayist  to 
speak  wisdom  albeit  debonairly,  to  be  thought-provok- 
ing .  without  heaviness,  and  helpful  without  didacti- 
cism. Keenly  does  he  feel  the  lacrymae  rerum,  but, 
sensitive  to  the  laughable  incongruities  of  human  ex- 
istence, he  has  a  safeguard  against  the  merely  solemn 
and  can  smile  at  himself  or  others,  preserving  his  sense 
of  humor  as  a  precious  gift  of  the  high  gods.  And 


fforeworfc 

most  of  all,  he  loves  his  fellow  men,  and  would  come 
into  fellowship  with  them  through  thought  that  is 
made  mellow  by  feeling.  If  these  qualities  are  lack- 
ing in  the  papers  that  follow,  it  is  but  an  example  of 
the  difference  between  desire  and  deed. 


mature 


LITTLE   ESSAYS   IN 
LITERATURE    AND    LIFE 

Immemorial 

AS  the  green  gives  way  to  the  gold,  and  the  browns 
and  russet  reds  mingle  in  the  landscape,  while 
overhead  the  haze  of  autumn  softens  and  makes  in- 
finitely suggestive  the  mood  of  Nature,  comes  once 
more  the  well-remembered  tang,  the  pungent  smell  of 
smoke  from  innumerable  fires.  From  boyhood  it  has 
been  for  me  (and  surely  for  many  others)  a  provoca- 
tive memory,  atmospheric  with  associations. 

I  recall,  from  far-off  fields  among  the  upland  hills, 
in  the  glad  vacation  time,  how  a  boy,  playing  at  hare 
and  hounds,  got  the  scent  in  his  nostrils  and,  as  he 
panted  on  toward  the  desired  end,  was  in  some  strange 
way  assisted  by  the  familiar  odor;  it  seemed  almost  an 
accompanying  friend.  Let  him  but  savor  it  now,  and 
the  intervening  years  roll  back,  and  across  the  chasm 
of  half  a  lifetime  arise  the  look  and  the  voice  of  child- 
hood. Or,  turning  a  corner  of  the  road,  he  is  sud- 
denly confronted  with  a  band  of  gipsies,  camped  beside 
the  way;  dark,  mystic  folk,  immensely  exciting  to  a 

3 


Xittie  Bssaps  in  ^Literature  an&  SLite 

lad's  imagination.  They  converse  in  a  tongue  which 
has  all  the  lure  of  the  alien  and  the  unknown ;  the  gar- 
ish picturesqueness  of  their  garb  is  but  an  outward 
symbol  of  their  higher  spiritual  implication;  they  tell 
fortunes,  they  know  the  stars,  wind,  and  weather  are 
their  familiars,  and,  most  of  all,  like  Whittier's  "  van- 
ishers,"  they  are  up  and  away  when  you  are  unaware, 
exulting  in  open-air  liberty,  disdaining  to  be  bound  by 
the  fixed  conventions  and  day-long  duties  of  common- 
place mankind.  And  ever,  as  their  colorful  forms  take 
shape  out  of  the  time-mists,  I  see  the  spiral  twists  of 
smoke  from  their  campfires  crawl  up  into  the  blue  air, 
and  again  the  smell  of  autumn  and  of  youth  challenges 
my  soul. 

Or  it  may  be,  far  up  the  side  of  the  New  England 
mountain,  the  same  boy  is  camping  out  with  his  mates  ; 
on  the  very  edge  of  the  wood-line  they  lie ;  a  few  steps 
higher,  and  the  bare,  rugged,  serrated  boulders  climb 
straight  to  the  summit,  wind-swept  and  splendid. 
Many  hours  has  it  taken  to  reach  this  place  of  shelter, 
and  the  little  band  of  adventurers  is  wet  and  cold  and 
hungry.  A  striking  scene  in  chiaroscuro  they  make, 
as  one  bends  down  to  give  hand-shelter  to  the  all- 
important  match;  a  scratch,  a  glimmer,  and  it  is  well, 
for,  the  sticks  being  gathered,  the  fire  is  alight,  and 
soon,  drawn  together  in  a  circle  that  is  older  than  civ- 
ilization, they  swap  stories  while  the  kettle  boils,  pre- 
pare their  food  and  look  up,  now  and  then,  in  a  sleepy 
half-wonder,  at  the  calm  great  stars  seen  through  a 

4 


Immemorial  jfires 

somber  setting  of  forest  trees.  Stand  away  a  little 
from  the  fire,  to  windward,  and  get  the  drift  of  the 
smoke.  There  it  is  again,  not  a  smell,  but  an  evoca- 
tion of  comradeship,  and  a  friendly  call  out  of  the  past ! 

Stand  with  me,  too,  for  a  moment  and  lean  against 
the  old  fence  rail,  as  you  let  the  eye  in  deep  content- 
ment range  over  a  field  where,  in  admirable  rank  and 
file,  the  corn  shocks  stretch  away;  like  so  many  Indian 
chiefs  they  stand,  sedate,  dignified,  in  a  beautiful  tonal- 
ity of  yellow  and  brown  and  gray.  And  from  some- 
where, on  the  field's  edge,  drifts  once  more  the  smoke 
of  a  hidden  fire  of  leaves  and  brush,  and  as  it  ascends 
into  the  winy  upper  sky  it  appears,  seen  through  the 
fruitful  rows,  as  if  these  silent  braves  were  gravely 
smoking  the  pipe  of  peace.  Nay,  if  you  will  but  listen, 
is  not  that  rustle  that  comes  to  the  ear  the  echo  of  the 
murmur  of  the  Indian  speech,  as  these  wise  ones  of 
the  open  places  whisper  the  sacred  secrets  of  their 
tribe? 

But  not  personal  only  are  such  memories,  summoned 
up  by  the  fires  of  autumn ;  racial  are  they,  too,  an  ata- 
vistic reminder  of  our  forefathers  in  days  of  eld, 
We  began  this  way,  we  denizens  of  the  town ;  and  let 
but  that  perfume  of  the  soul  of  leaves  get  in  our  nos- 
trils; and  there  is  a  stirring,  vague  yet  strong,  of  hap- 
penings that  well-nigh  antedate  the  years.  Beside 
such  a  fire,  in  Time's  very  dawn,  once  knelt  the 
son  of  man;  beside  it,  too,  he  ate  his  simple  meal,  ere 
he  resumed  the  trail  and  faced  the  perilous  future. 

5 


Xfttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  OLtte 

To  look  forward  to  it  on  the  march,  or  after  the  hunt, 
was  as  a  beacon  of  hope;  all  the  cheer  and  consolation 
of  home  rose  in  his  mind  with  its  smoky  spirals,  and 
the  crackling  of  its  flame  was  as  the  call  of  kin  across 
gloomed,  lost  places.  Its  red  eye  through  the  wood 
promised  protection  at  the  day's  end;  the  wild  beasts 
slunk  away,  as  did  two-footed  enemies,  at  sight  of  that 
sign  of  habitation,  and  the  presence  of  that  social  odor. 
If  the  Promethean  gift  of  fire  brought  the  dawn  of 
civilization,  the  camp-fire  smoke  and  the  smell  of  burnt 
leaves  or  clean,  sweet  boughs  accompany  man's  passage 
out  of  the  unknown  into  history.  For  the  Israelite 
by  day,  the  symbol  of  the  pillar  of  cloud ;  but  by  night, 
the  pillar  of  fire. 

And  with  all  our  boasted  gain  in  creature  comfort, 
how  glad  are  the  epicure  and  the  aristocrat  to  return 
to  this  primitive  thing,  the  open  fire,  indoors  and  out! 
How  he  revels  in  the  household  group  before  the  blaze, 
with  swept  hearth  and  apples  a-toasting;  while,  be- 
yond the  confines  of  the  housed-in  life,  he  doubly 
relishes  his  simple  food,  if  but  it  be  prepared  by  the 
roadside  or  midwood  fire,  and  eaten  beneath  sun  or 
stars,  in  that  "  great,  good  place,  outdoors."  After 
all,  we  seem  not  to  have  come  so  far,  despite  all  the  de^ 
vices  and  agencies  of  social  evolution,  when  still  to-day 
we  can  derive  no  greater  comfort  than  from  that 
which  the  Phoenician  knew,  the  Egyptian  welcomed, 
the  red  man  cherished;  yes,  and  the  caveman  must 
have  used.  The  smoke-drift  of  their  experience 

6 


immemorial  ffires 

mingles  with  and  makes  mellow  the  time-drift  of  the 
years,  and  by  a  sweet,  ancient  odor  are  we  all  united. 
After  all,  the  fire  is  still  the  great  symbol  of  home. 
As  Kipling  says: 

How  can  I  answer  which  is  best 

Of  all  the  fires  that  burn  ? 
I  have  been  too  often  host  and  guest 

At  every  fire  in  turn. 

And  so  it  is  that  this  month  of  October,  the  wine 
month,  as  the  Hollanders  call  it,  brings  in  its  recur- 
rent splendor,  its  sober  majesty,  along  with  other  gifts 
and  tokens  not  a  few,  this  gift  of  fires  that  purify  dead 
matter,  with  the  attendant  smoke  that  is  a  spiritual 
note  in  the  autumn  landscape  and  evocative  of  many 
far-ranging  memories  for  the  individual  and  the  race. 
It  is  a  month  that  breeds  reminiscence;  a  month  in 
which  Lamb  might  have  written  "  The  Old  Familiar 
Faces,"  or  Landor  penned  the  unforgettable  lines  to 
the  memoried  maiden: 

Rose  Aylmer,  whom  these  wakeful  eyes 
May  weep  but  never  see, 
A  night  of  memories  and  of  sighs 
I  consecrate  to  thee. 

October!  Like  Keats's  "  farewell,"  "  the  very  sound 
is  like  a  bell  " ;  a  rich,  chiming,  deep-voweled  word  in 
whose  reverberations,  so  many  and  so  wide,  I  find  this 
memory  of  fires  by  field  and  wayside  and  wood,  with 
the  fragrant  scent  of  wind-born  smoke  and  a  magic 
out  of  old,  old  times. 

7 


fliMracle  Callefc  Spring 

EVER  since  man's  imagination  found  expression  in 
literature,  spring  has  been  limned  in  the  figure 
of  a  coquette.  And  small  wonder,  we  exclaim,  as 
we  are  compelled  once  again  to  endure  the  tantalizing 
probation  which  ushers  in  the  glad,  recurrent  miracle. 

March  is  here,  and,  like  her  blustering  winds,  blows 
our  hopes  everywhere,  till  we  scarce  know  if  it  be  a 
winter  face  or  a  smile  of  June  that  peeps  at  us  around 
the  corner.  Then,  while  we  catch  our  breath,  April, 
bewitching,  maddening  blend  of  tears  and  laughter, 
never  sure,  ever  promiseful,  comes  tripping  by  and, 
with  a  blithe  bow  at  last,  lets  in  the  scented  magic 
and  the  divine  foretaste  of  the  full  summertide  that 
goes  under  the  name  of  May. 

Strange  it  is,  too,  how  spring,  teasing  us  thus  yearly, 
and  known  in  all  her  ways,  can  yet  keep  back  so  much 
of  surprise  and  offer  so  greatly  of  variety  that  her 
coming  bids  our  pulses  beat  and  our  eyes  dilate  as  be- 
fore a  bit  of  legerdemain.  The  mere  instinctive  boy 
turns  livelier  and  merrier;  the  gaffer  in  the  sun  feels 
at  his  withered  heart  a  touch  that  warms  like  wine. 
The  farmer  rejoices  as  he  sows  his  seed,  and  remembers 
that  he,  of  all  men,  has  an  occupation  the  freest  and 

8 


Ufoe  /HMracle  Gaiiefc  Spring 

noblest,  since  he  looks  alone  to  Nature  and  Nature's 
God.  And  the  man  of  religion  points  a  moral  from 
the  season  with  the  parable  of  rebirth,  and  speaks 
with  the  more  assurance  of  the  Resurrection  and  the 
Life. 

Modern  thought  inclines  to  consider  a  miracle  not 
so  much  a  violation  of  Nature's  laws  as  a  new  and  at 
first  unbelievable  revelation  of  Nature's  larger  powers. 
And  spring,  with  all  it  implies,  would  be  a  miracle 
indeed,  were  it  seen  for  the  first  time.  Who,  without 
seeing  it,  would  put  credence  in  the  stirring  of  the 
dry  earth  to  give  forth  tender,  green  shoots,  or  have 
faith  in  the  vital  urge  wherefrom  the  sap  runs  up  in 
the  trees  and  a  shower  of  apple-blossoms  fills  all  the 
air  with  fragrance?  But  we  behold  it  annually,  and 
we  come  to  trust  this  sweet  and  splendid  reawakening 
after  the  winter  sleep,  and  our  joy  falls  instinctively 
into  the  matchless  rhythm  of  "  The  Song  of  Songs  " : 

The  voice  of  my  beloved!  behold,  he  cometh  leaping  upon 
the  mountains,  skipping  upon  the  hills. 

My  beloved  is  like  a  roe  or  a  young  hart:  behold,  he  stand- 
eth  behind  our  wall,  he  looketh  forth  at  the  windows,  shewing 
himself  through  the  lattice. 

My  beloved  spake,  and  said  unto  me,  Rise  up,  my  love, 
my  fair  one,  and  come  away. 

For,  lo,  the  winter  is  past,  the  rain  is  over  and  gone; 

The  flowers  appear  on  the  earth;  the  time  of  the  singing- of 
birds  is  come  and  the  voice  of  the  turtle  is  heard  in  our  land ; 

The  fig  tree  putteth  forth  her  green  figs,  and  the  vines 
with  the  tender  grape  give  a  good  smell.  Arise,  my  love,  my 
fair  one,  and  come  away. 


Xfttle  Essaps  in  Xtterarure  an&  Xife 

This  outer  magic  of  change  from  winter  to  spring, 
from  stagnation  to  the  life-throb  which  shall  bring 
fruition,  makes  an  inward  miracle  in  man :  love  awakes 
and  the  divine  unrest  we  call  wanderlust,  and  hope 
that  scales  heaven's  gate.  If  the  young  man's  fancy 
turns  to  thoughts  of  love,  the  fancy  of  all  men  at  this 
season  of  lovely  witchery  expands  with  a  sense  of  the 
infinite  possibilities  offered  by  the  world,  a  sense  of  the 
bliss  that  would  break  through  the  harsh  crust  of  liv- 
ing, as  the  flower  breaks  through  the  sod.  Gipsy  long- 
ing seizes  upon  the  most  sedate;  the  beck  of  the  long, 
white  road  is  for  some  of  us  like  an  imperative  com- 
mand; beyond  the  horizon  lie  our  hopes,  our  dreams, 
like  many-colored  clouds  at  sunset.  "  Out  into  the 
open  "  cries  the  heart,  and  the  legs  are  fain  to  follow. 

Oh,  to  dream,  Oh,  to  awake  and  wander 
There,  and  with  delight  to  take  and  render 
Through  the  trance  of  silence 
Quiet  breath, 

—  as  Stevenson  sings  it ;  and  Bliss  Carman,  with  a 
pantheistic  worship  in  his  soul,  invokes  April  as  a 
young  goddess  whose  touch  is  potent  to  change  us  all. 

And  thy  great  heart  beats  and  quivers 
To  revive  the  days  that  were; 
Make  me  over,  Mother  April, 
When  the  sap  begins  to  stir! 

There  is  in  this  summons  of  the  spring,  deeper  than 
its  blind  instinct  of  joy  and  higher  than  its  strongest 

10 


Ube  flMracle  Cailefc  Sprino 

lure  of  earthy  rapture,  a  spiritual  note  of  promise  that 
is  yet  peace ;  here,  perhaps,  is  its  noblest  service  to  man- 
kind. Joy  is  good,  but  adoration  is  better  still.  The 
mind  that,  looking  out  upon  the  beauty  of  the  fourth 
month,  is  not  aware  of  thoughts  that  are  holy  and 
wise,  is  barren  indeed,  and  closed  about  in  a  winter 
mood  of  negation  and  death.  Wordsworth,  from  his 
land  of  lakes  and  fells,  sent  us  many  such  messages, 
as  when  he  sang: 

One  impulse  from  a  vernal   wood, 
May  teach  you  more  of  man, 
Of  moral  evil  and  of  good 
Than  all  the  sages  can. 

And  England's  mighty  nature  poet  meant  it, 
for  he  knew  that  the  intuitions  and  emotions  grasp 
truth  forever  shut  away  from  the  processes  of  the 
brain ;  knew,  moreover,  that  nothing  in  God's  breath- 
ing universe  stirs  us  to  the  depths  more  surely  than  the 
emanations  of  April  and  the  ministries  of  May. 

Summer  in  her  completeness  is  just  ahead,  to  be  sure. 
It  might  seem  that  summer  were  a  better  time.  But, 
no,  the  early  hint  is  more  precious:  herein  is  the 
difference  between  promise  and  performance.  The 
imagination  is  a  wonder-worker,  and  the  half  becomes 
more  than  the  whole,  in  nature,  even  as  it  is  in  art. 

So,  for  many  reasons,  where  no  reason  but  the 
natural  response  to  a  beautiful  thing  is  necessary,  we 
welcome  the  annual  return  and  happy  harbinger  of 

II 


%tttie  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 

Nature's  mood  of  benison  and  bounty.  If  it  delay  we 
are  sorely  tried,  yet  are  not  as  those  without  hope. 
And  when  it  arrives,  we  are  "  like  them  that  dream," 
dazed  with  delight  and  heady  intoxication  of  sense 
and  spirit.  Never,  we  say,  was  it  quite  so  rare  and 
riant  as  this  year ;  never  the  birds  so  blithe,  the  flowers 
so  full  of  scent,  the  very  smile  of  earth  and  sky  so 
eloquent  of  innumerable  pledges  and  tokens.  No  time, 
this,  for  the  cheap  mockery  of  spring  and  the  songs 
of  spring,  whereby  wretched  would-be  humorists  gain 
a  dubious  livelihood,  like  obnoxious  insects  befouling 
the  candid  petal  of  a  rich  red  rose.  Away  with  aught 
but  joy  and  exaltation,  belief  in  beauty  and  thankful- 
ness at  being  alive,  that  we  are  still  a-pulse,  and  parts, 
however  small,  of  the  processional  splendor  of  the  sea- 
son. The  coming  of  spring,  to  our  sense  of  poetry, 
explains  the  winter;  never  could  the  one  be  so  fair,  un- 
less the  other  came  before,  to  make  the  contrast: 

For   the    sweetest   of    all    seasons 
Is  that  which  follows  pain, 
And    the  best   of  winter's    reasons, 
Is  the  summer  here  again. 


12 


Owning  tbe  JEartb 

Y  idea  of  riches  is  to  own  the  earth,"  was  the 
whimsical  remark  of  a  friend  of  mine,  whose 
holdings  of  real  estate  are  large.  It  was  an  expres- 
sion of  that  love  of  landed  possessions,  that  zest  for 
contact  with  the  soil,  which  in  the  United  States  is 
now  so  commonly  familiar,  and  in  a  country  like  Eng- 
land has  led  to  one  man  owning  a  county,  and  has  be- 
come almost  a  national  instinct.  Doubtless,  it  is  this 
feeling  for  the  possession  of  the  earth  we  walk  on, 
which  constitutes  one  of  the  obstacles  to  all  commu- 
nistic or  socialistic  theories  of  land-holding. 

The  idea  is  certainly  capable  of  abuse  and  has  its 
bad  side;  but  also  it  is  deeply  implanted  in  man,  and 
many  good  things  have  come  from  its  exercise.  One 
who  owns  land  in  freehold  is  stimulated  thereby  to 
work  his  doughtiest,  with  good  cheer,  led  on  by  hope. 
See  such  a  man  dig  into  his  soil,  and  compare  him  with 
the  day-laborer  who,  with  dull  iteration,  handles  his 
spade  against  the  coming  of  mealtime.  He  has  no  re- 
lation to,  no  affection  for,  the  spot  he  stands  on. 
He  lacks  rootage. 

There  is  rest  for  the  weary,  too,  in  the  chance  to 
escape  from  the  madding  crowd  and  get  behind  his 

13 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  a^  %ite 

private  defenses  after  bearing  the  brunt  of  the  combat. 
Carry  this  too  far,  and  you  become  antisocial;  but  it 
has  a  legitimate  use,  beyond  question,  and  the  worker 
goes  back  all  the  more  fitted  for  social  service,  who 
can  get  somewhere  on  his  own  acres  and  feel  that  there 
is  a  fence  or  a  hedge  between  him  and  interruption  for 
a  few  hours.  To  ring  around  your  possession  with  a 
fence  or  other  sign  of  demarcation  is  to  experience  the 
deeper  content  of  privacy.  The  full  joy  of  asking 
friends  to  share  your  pleasure  in  your  own  can  be 
tasted  only  when  you  set  apart  the  particular  section 
of  earth  which  is  yours  in  some  such  fashion  from  the 
rest  of  the  world.  You  get  satisfaction  in  showing 
a  friend  the  fine  views  in  a  public  park;  but  what  is 
that  contrasted  with  the  zest  with  which  you  point 
out  the  autumnal  coloring  in  your  own  wood,  or  listen 
to  his  exclamations  of  delight  at  the  river  which  winds 
its  way  between  your  ancestral  banks!  The  English, 
behind  their  walls  and  hedges,  have  developed  a  home 
life  that  is  one  of  the  sources  of  their  hereditary 
strength.  How  may  the  frayed  nerves  regain  equipoise, 
with  no  barrier  between  you  and  your  neighbor, 
whose  dog  is  in  your  flower  garden  and  his  small  boy 
kicking  a  football  that  bounds  against  your  plate-glass 
window?  There  is  a  limit  even  to  neighborliness  un- 
der such  circumstances. 

To  own  the  earth,  again,  attaches  a  man  to  one 
place,  which  is  well.  When  man  ceases  to  be  a 
nomad,  a  long  step  forward  in  civilization  has  been 

14 


tbe  Bartb 

made.  The  gipsy  wanderer,  he  who  feels  the  lure 
of  the  long  white  road  and  who  in  our  time  degenerates 
into  the  familiar  hobo,  seems  to  the  superficial  gaze  a 
freer  person  than  does  he  of  the  acres  and  local  in- 
terests. But,  really,  it  is  not  so;  it  is  the  other  way 
round.  "  Land  from  the  first,"  says  the  historian 
Green,  with  feudal  England  in  mind,  "  was  the  test 
of  freedom."  He  means,  of  course,  that  it  was  only 
when  the  farmer  got  freehold  possession  of  his  prop- 
erty that  he  shook  off  the  overlordship  which  made 
him  a  sort  of  slave,  and  could  conduct  himself  as  an 
independent  man.  And  it  is  the  farmer,  then  and  now, 
who  is  in  a  sense  the  most  unshackled  of  mortals,  be- 
cause he  looks  not  to  man,  but  to  Nature  and  to  God 
for  the  results  of  his  toil.  Benjamin  Franklin  ex- 
pressed it  memorably  more  than  a  century  ago :  "  I 
think  agriculture  the  most  honorable  of  all  employ- 
ments, being  the  most  independent.  The  farmer  has 
no  need  of  popular  favor  nor  the  favor  of  the  great, 
the  success  of  his  crops  depending  on  the  blessing  of 
God  upon  his  industry." 

There  is  indeed  a  peculiar  dignity  about  work  that 
is  steady  in  time  and  defined  in  space,  in  comparison 
with  that  which  is  sporadic  and  bears  no  relation  to 
yesterday  and  to-morrow.  And  the  sense  of  freedom 
comes  to  man  not  alone  from  the  thought  that  below 
him  is  earth  he  owns,  but  also  from  the  companion 
thought  that  he  owns  upward  into  the  heavens.  No 
skyscraper  blocks  his  view;  he  can  quote  the  epitaph, 

15 


Xfttle  Essays  tn  Xiterature  atto  Xife 

derived  from  a  well-known  legal  sentence  and  set  upon 
the  tomb  of  a  lawyer  whose  reputation  was  of  good 
savor: 

Beneath  this  stone  an  honest  lawyer  lies; 

Who  owns  the  earth,  owns  upward  to  the  skies. 

It  is  good  to  see  how,  of  late  years,  the  custom  of 
going  back  to  the  country  and  getting  closer  to  the  soil, 
by  sympathetic  living  on  it  and  through  acquiring  it  as 
a  possession,  has  grown  in  this  land.  To  live  the 
simple  life,  as  Wagner  taught  us  to  call  it,  an  affec- 
tionate communion  with  Nature :  surely  this  is  a  needed 
antidote  to  the  congestion  of  the  city  and  all  its  un- 
lovely connotations.  Country  life  is  just  as  whole- 
some as  a  corrective  now  as  it  was  in  the  days  when 
Horace  cried  up  the  pleasures  of  his  Sabine  farm,  and 
declared  him  happy  who,  afar  from  business,  cul- 
tivated his  ancestral  acres  in  dignified  retirement. 
How  much  of  health  and  peace  of  mind  and  kindly  re- 
lation to  everything  seems  to  come  to  one  who  takes  to 
the  cultivation  of  his  own  garden.  How  much  more 
he  gets  out  of  it  than  if  he  were  simply  the  salaried 
gardener;  not  so  much  in  the  literal  sense,  for  there 
the  gardener  would  be  likely  to  beat  him,  but  in  the 
sense  of  return  in  terms  of  living.  Charles  Dudley 
Warner  surely  would  never  have  had  those  delightful 
experiences  which  make  "  My  Summer  in  a  Garden  " 
such  pleasant  reading,  had  that  garden  (where,  by 
the  way,  I  smoked  hayseed  as  a  boy)  been  a  public 

16 


tbe  Bartb 

one.  Fancy  such  a  thing!  As  well  compare,  as  does 
Warner,  a  register  indoors  with  an  open  fire  on  the 
hearth,  or  a  gaslight  with  the  sun. 

"  When  we  have  come  to  live  on  the  fruits  of  our 
own  gardens,"  says  Emerson  in  his  Journal,  "  and  be- 
gin to  boast  that  we  live  a  man's  life,  then  shall  come 
some  audacious  upstart  to  upbraid  us  with  our  false 
and  foreign  taste,  which  steadily  plucks  up  everything 
which  Nature  puts  in  our  soil,  and  laboriously  plants 
everything  not  intended  to  grow  there."  The  Concord 
sage  might  not  have  written  the  words  to-day,  when 
the  hegira  into  the  country  is  becoming  so  general, 
and  the  care  of  the  ground  so  intelligently  conducted. 
Few,  even  now,  are  willing  to  live  so  austerely  close 
to  the  bosom  of  Nature  as  did  Emerson's  neighbor, 
Thoreau,  during  the  period  of  his  Walden  Pond  experi- 
ment. But  an  increasing  number  are  gladly  learning 
the  wholesome  lesson  set  forth  in  the  fable  of  Antaeus: 
they  are  growing  strong  through  contact  with  the 
earth,  and  thus  they  safely  defy  the  Hercules  of  nerv- 
ous wear  and  tear. 

Of  a  truth,  central  in  the  experience  is  that  feeling 
of  ownership,  a  sense  of  possession  which  makes  for  dig- 
nity and  the  obligations  and  duties  which  steady  men. 
Travel  is  no  longer  travel,  unless,  finally,  we  may  turn 
us  home. 


<§>ur  fil&er  Brothers 

OUR  elder  brothers  they  have  come  to  be  called 
in  our  day,  by  many  a  deep-hearted  and  lofty 
writer,  inspired  to  that  wider  world-vision  which  lifts 
him  into  seership.  The  note  was  struck  by  Coleridge 
in  "  The  Ancient  Mariner,"  when  he  pictured  evil 
as  issuing,  so  to  say,  with  the  life  blood  of  the  albatross. 
It  sounded  earlier  in  Sterne  when,  in  "  Tristram 
Shandy,"  he  makes  dear  Uncle  Toby  release  the  fly 
with  those  memorable  words :  "  Go,  poor  devil,  get 
thee  gone,  why  should  I  hurt  thee  ?  The  world  surely 
is  wide  enough  to  hold  both  thee  and  me." 

The  feeling  is  dominant  in  Browning's  poem  on 
Tray,  the  "  mere  instinctive  dog "  who  dived  down 
into  the  water  and  saved  a  little  child,  while  the  hu- 
mans stood  about  and  did  nothing.  It  is  a  familiar 
refrain  in  the  song  of  Bliss  Carman,  who  is  forever 
hymning  the  little  brothers  of  the  air  and  earth,  the 
birds  and  beasts  of  forest  and  field  and  flood,  who, 
like  us  mortals,  have  briefly  the  privilege  of  inhabiting 
this  world.  Unlike  us,  they  can  pierce  the  sky  and 
burrow  in  the  soil  without  the  aid  of  machinery;  but 
are  like  us  again  in  the  frail  tenure  which  is  theirs 
upon  the  life  that  is  the  common  and  precious  posses- 
sion of  man  and  beast.  The  tenderness  for  and  sym- 

18 


Brotbers 

pathy  with  the  so-called  lower  animals  so  notable  in  the 
literature  of  the  last  hundred  years,  and  of  steadily 
increasing  volume,  mark  a  change  that  keeps  pace 
with  the  new  ideas  of  science  and  the  better  under- 
standing of  the  biologic  principles  of  life.  Both 
science  and  religion,  indeed,  have  had  a  hand  in  it. 
Happily,  the  days  when  civilized  peoples  like  the 
Greeks  or  Hebrews  could  offer  blood-sacrifices  of 
animals,  with  the  idea  that  a  deity  worthy  the  name 
should  thus  be  propitiated,  have  passed  away  long  since. 
It  is  easy,  of  course,  to  make  cheap  fun  of  the  idea; 
the  penny-a-liner,  like  the  poor,  is  always  with  us  and 
we  are  too  familiar  with  facetious  references  to  our 
Simian  ancestors  clinging  by  the  caudal  appendage  to 
the  branches  of  an  arboreal  eld  and  filling  primeval 
forests  with  their  chatter.  The  cheapness  of  it  lies  in 
the  fact  that  behind  the  silly  laugh  is  a  sober  and 
astounding  theory,  which  has  revolutionized  modern 
thought  and  given  man  a  new  conception  of  heaven 
and  of  earth.  The  Darwinian  theory  of  the  develop- 
ment of  life  upon  this  planet  is  not  proved,  strictly 
speaking;  it  is  merely  a  hypothesis.  But  it  is  one  which, 
so  far  as  we  have  gone,  best  serves  to  explain  the  facts 
as  we  have  acquired  them;  and  for  this  reason  it  has 
won  the  acceptance,  to  a  point  of  practical  unanimity, 
of  the  scientific  world.  Among  the  good  things  it  has 
done  is  to  be  found  the  influence  exercised  by  the  new 
view  of  organic  processes  upon  man's  attitude  toward 
the  lower  animals.  Their  rights  have  come  to  be 

19 


Xittie  Essays  tn  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 

recognized  and  respected  as  never  under  the  old  dis- 
pensation, and  "  certain  other  duties "  established  in 
the  better  class  of  minds  by  the  thought  that  ethical 
obligations  exist  here,  as  in  human  relations.  The 
scientific  teaching  of  the  oneness  of  all  life  and  the  con- 
sequent removal  of  the  former  hard-and-fast  line  be- 
tween brute  and  human  have  inevitably  wrought  to 
quicken  this  modern  conception. 

On  all  sides  are  signs  of  the  change.  Such  a  book 
as  that  on  "  Animal  Rights,"  by  the  well-known  Eng- 
lish thinker,  H.  S.  Salt,  is  one  of  many  which  illustrate 
the  newer  attitude.  The  growth  of  our  state  or  pri- 
vate humane  societies,  which  safeguard  the  interests  of 
animals  that  are  impressed  into  man's  service  and  have 
suffered  centuries  of  cruelty  at  his  hands,  is  another 
sign.  Animals  slain  for  purposes  of  food  are  put  out 
of  existence  more  mercifully,  because  of  the  greater 
sensitiveness  to  their  point  of  view. 

Biological  researches  have  put  us  in  a  position 
to  realize  more  clearly  the  sufferings  of  the  animal 
underworld.  Hospitals  for  dogs,  horses,  and  cats  are 
no  longer  so  novel  as  to  awaken  the  sneering  laughter 
of  the  unthoughtful  and  callous. 

It  has  almost  become  bad  form  to  be  unnecessarily 
cruel  to  a  defenseless  creature  whose  very  lack  of 
protection  should  make  an  appeal  to  mercy.  Soon, 
any  cruelty,  it  may  be  surmised,  will  be  frowned  upon 
as  uncivilized.  Of  old,  it  was  common  enough  to  hear 
in  justification  of  some  barbarous  treatment  of  an 

20 


<S>ur  Eifcer  Brotbers 

animal  a  remark  to  the  effect  that  it  did  not  matter, 
since  it  was  not  a  human  being.  "  Animals,  don't  you 
know,  have  no  souls."  But  these  delightfully  pre- 
historic utterances  are  coming  to  sound  hopelessly  old- 
fashioned  on  the  lips  of  any  one  who  makes  the  slightest 
pretense  to  be  modern.  It  is  easier  for  us  to  detect 
glimmers  of  what  looks  very  much  like  "  soul  "  in 
some  animals;  and  harder  to  find  it  in  some  men. 
We  may  even  look  confidently  forward  to  the  day 
when  a  really  modern  mother  will  not  allow  her  dear 
little  boy  to  impale  a  beautiful  butterfly  upon  a  pin 
and  to  derive  enjoyment  from  the  slow  waving  of 
those  God-painted  wings,  whose  rhythmic  beating  is 
the  innocent  and  lovely  creature's  only  way  of  ago- 
nized protest.  Yes,  mothers,  and  their  boys  along  with 
them,  will  be  educated  in  the  fullness  of  time. 

It  may  well  be  that,  with  the  further  unfolding 
of  this  nobler  feeling,  the  strained  relations  now  ex- 
isting between  man  and  many  kinds  of  animals  will 
be  removed.  Think  of  the  dog  in  the  human  home 
to-day:  beloved  and  cherished  like  one  of  our  own  and 
mourned  in  his  passing  as  if  of  human  race!  Hear 
those  lines  of  Byron  as  he  satirizes  man  and  bemoans 
the  loss  of  a  canine  favorite: 

To  mark  a  friend's  remains  these  stones  arise; 
I  never  knew  but  one,  and  here  he  lies. 

John  Muir,  the  naturalist,  has  said  that  he  found 
that   even   the   carnivora   of    the    Rocky    Mountains, 
21 


Xittle  Essays  in  Xiterature  atto  %ife 

when  he  camped  fearlessly  among  them,  were  not  his 
enemies;  they  came  and  sniffed  at  him,  and  departed, 
leaving  him  unmolested.  And  this,  in  spite  of  all  the 
years  during  which  the  word  has  been  handed  down 
among  them,  "  Beware  of  man  and  his  weapons !  " 

One  of  Turgenev's  wonderful  "  Poems  in  Prose  " 
narrates  how  the  author,  on  the  deck  of  a  ship  in  a 
great  storm,  was  startled  in  the  midst  of  the  tempest 
to  feel  a  little  cold  hand  slip  into  his  own.  Looking 
down,  he  saw  a  monkey  which,  terrified  by  the  tem- 
pest, had  sought  the  man  in  the  instinctive  desire  for 
companionship  in  the  face  of  a  mighty  common  peril. 
Any  line  of  separation  was  obliterated  in  the  moment 
when  Nature  was  a  menace  to  all  living  things.  And 
in  beautiful  words  Turgenev  tells  what  a  strange  sen- 
sation of  union  with  the  timorous  beast  was  produced 
in  his  mind.  The  incident  may  be  taken  as  an  al- 
legory; it  gives  assurance  of  a  day  when  our  kindness 
will  extend  to  all  God's  creatures,  and  these  elder 
brothers  of  ours,  so  long  outcast  from  our  fellowship, 
shall  come  into  their  own  of  friendship  and  of  love. 


22 


flron?  of  mature 

T  N  his  delightful  reminiscences,  "  Thirty  Years  of 
•*•  Paris,"  Alphonse  Daudet  tells  of  his  companion- 
ship with  Turgenev  in  those  memorable  evenings  when 
he,  Goncourt,  Zola,  and  the  mighty  Russian  ate  sup- 
per together  and  talked  of  literature  and  life.  He 
recalls  how  Turgenev  gave  him  every  evidence  of 
friendship  and  affection ;  but  long  after  his  death,  Dau- 
det read  certain  words  of  his  friend,  wherein  the 
author  of  "  Fathers  and  Sons  "  sneers  at  his  French 
confrere  as  "  the  lowest  of  my  kind."  And  Daudet, 
with  that  wonderful  Gallic  lightness  of  touch  which 
hides  yet  reveals  the  deep  things  of  the  heart,  sighs 
over  the  disillusionment,  and  exclaims:  "I  can  see 
him  in  my  house,  at  my  table,  gentle,  affectionate, 
kissing  my  children.  I  have  in  my  possession  many 
exquisite,  warm-hearted  letters  from  him.  And  this 
was  what  lay  concealed  beneath  that  kindly  smile. 
Good  heavens!  How  strange  life  is,  and  how  true 
that  charming  word  of  the  Greek  language,  eironeia!  " 
Yet  this  is  the  irony  of  character  and  circumstance. 
There  is  in  life  one  deeper  yet  and  more  terrible:  the 
irony  of  Nature.  You  feel  that  the  Daudet  episode 
might  possibly  be  straightened  out,  that  "  the  faith  be- 

23 


Xfttle  JBB8&V8  in  ^Literature  an&  tfcife 


tween  friends  "  may  haply  be  restored.  But  the  other  is 
different,  hopeless.  Hawthorne's  "The  Ambitious 
Guest  "  narrates  how  a  family  of  cheerful  folk  sit  talk- 
ing with  a  guest  for  the  night,  in  their  house  far  up  in 
the  White  Mountains,  and  discourse  of  human  fate  and 
their  particular  desires.  Of  a  sudden  they  are  inter- 
rupted by  a  sound  of  awful  omen  ;  there  is  a  landslide, 
and  when  they  realize  that  destruction  is  upon  them  they 
rush  forth  from  the  house  to  seek  a  place  of  safety,  only 
to  be  buried  under  the  avalanche,  one  and  all.  But  the 
house  in  which  they  sat  escapes  scot  free.  Had  they 
remained  about  the  fire  and  continued  their  friendly 
converse,  they  would  not  have  perished.  Acting  for 
what  seemed  to  be  the  best,  they  were  ruthlessly  ex- 
terminated, since  the  processes  of  Nature,  represented 
in  this  case  by  the  landslide,  pay  no  heed  to  that  petty 
creature,  man,  and  move  on  their  mysterious  ways,  as 
if  in  mockery  of  his  ineptness  and  ignorance  of  the  fall 
of  events.  At  such  a  juncture,  a  Plato,  a  Caesar  or  a 
Shakspere  is  as  helpless  as  the  commonest  of  the  earth. 
Here  is  that  irony  which,  sooner  or  later,  confronts 
every  thoughtful  mind  and  no  doubt  often  shakes  the 
very  foundations  of  faith.  And  surely  it  is  far  sadder 
than  the  irony  which  inheres  in  character,  because  it 
is,  or  seems,  irremediable.  Millions  of  human  beings 
in  the  world's  history  have  taken  steps  to  the  best  of 
their  judgment  and  actuated  by  the  highest  motives, 
only  to  be  precipitated  into  calamity  and  to  lose  their 
lives  in  a  manner  so  disastrous  as  to  make  the  looker- 

24 


Ube  flrons  of  mature 

on  shudder  with  horror.  Nature,  magnificently  in- 
different to  the  animalcule  who  for  a  brief  term  of 
time  struts  and  prates  upon  the  earth,  conducts  her 
business  according  to  great  general  laws,  utterly  re- 
fusing to  consider  the  convenience,  comfort,  or  welfare 
of  such  an  unimportant  item  in  the  teeming  universe. 
Often  the  ironic  scene  is  on  a  scale  of  epic  grandeur. 
Not  men  as  individuals,  but  whole  cities  go  down  to 
death :  Pompeii  lies  buried  beneath  the  lava,  San  Fran- 
cisco goes  up  in  smoke,  Messina  is  shaken  into  ruins. 
At  first,  the  spectacle  of  this  cruel  unconcern  of 
Nature  is  of  staggering  effect ;  that  sometimes  it  breeds 
pessimism  can  well  be  understood.  How,  in  truth,  can 
this  seemingly  heartless  procedure  on  the  part  of  Na- 
ture—  meaning  by  the  word  a  personification  of  the 
laws  and  processes  operative  in  the  physical  universe  as 
observed  by  man  —  be  explained,  so  that  we  may  re- 
turn to  the  soothing  thought  that  not  a  sparrow  falls 
unnoted,  and  that,  in  the  forever  lovely  words  of 
Coleridge, 

He  prayeth  best  who  loveth  best 
All  things  both  great  and  small; 
For  the  dear  God  who  loveth  us, 
He  made  and  loveth  all. 

Of  course,  all  such  inquiry  can  be  dismissed  on  the 
ground  that  man  is  not  intended  to  understand,  that 
his  limitations  make  mystery  inevitable,  and  that  faith 
is  thus  exercised  as  it  faces  the  vast  and  curious  antin- 
omies of  human  life  and  the  course  of  Nature.  If 
25 


Xtttle  Bssags  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

we  could  comprehend  all,  there  were  no  proper  place 
for  that  spirit  of  trust  —  yea,  even  though  it  slay  us !  — 
which  is  the  very  basis  of  religion. 

Perhaps  another  thought  helps  a  little  when  one's 
mood  is  darkened  by  the  apparent  irony,  whether  of 
man  or  Nature.  Why  may  it  not  be  that  all  such 
catastrophic  occurrences  are  but  a  reminder  to  us 
worldlings  of  the  false  valuations  which  are  set  upon 
life?  Since  it  is  natural  for  all  to  die,  the  manner  of 
going  is  secondary;  and  so-called  catastrophes  are,  as 
a  rule,  horrible  to  the  observer  rather  than  to. the  victim, 
who  most  often  is  painlessly  and  instantly  removed 
from  consciousness.  But  even  if  we  conceded  the  suf- 
fering, it  still  remains  true  in  a  high  and  holy  sense 
that  nothing  evil  can  happen  to  a  good  man, —  worldly 
evil,  yes,  in  plenty,  but  not  that  evil  which  is  the 
only  true  tragedy  to  the  philosopher:  spiritual  failure. 
What  we  call  our  tragedies  are,  speaking  by  and  large, 
merely  violent  and  unexpected  interruptions  of  pleasure. 
And  it  is  certainly  salutary  to  be  reminded,  although  in 
a  way  that  is  repellent,  that  one  whom  physical  dis- 
aster overcomes  can  yet  sleep  with  that  smile  upon  his 
face  which  is  a  sign  of  triumph,  and  the  certificate  of 
a  rest  well  won.  The  solemn  saying  of  the  Greek, 
"  call  no  man  happy  until  he  is  dead,"  was  not  uttered 
in  cheap  cynicism,  but  had  in  mind  the  fact  that  each 
day  until  the  end  is  a  chance  for  the  spiritual  success 
or  defeat;  and  that,  therefore,  we  may  not  claim  the 
victory  until  all  the  days  be  numbered.  It  may  well 

26 


1Fron£  of  IRature 

be,  therefore,  that  what  is  known  as  the  "  pathetic  fal- 
lacy "  in  literature,  the  mood  of  loving  trust  which 
makes  Wordsworth  see  beneficent  intention  in  "  earth's 
diurnal  course,"  and  sing  in  his  own  winsome  way, 

One  impulse  from  a  vernal  wood 
May  teach  you  more  of  man, 
Of  moral  evil  and  of  good 
Than   all  the  sages  can, 

—  expresses  a  truth,  a  spiritual  fact,  deeper  than  any 
process  of  logic,  and  more  trustworthy  than  all  self- 
conscious  reasoning.  Explain  it  as  we  will,  and  what- 
ever be  the  testimony  of  the  brain,  there  is,  as  countless 
stricken  souls  are  aware,  a  communion  with  Nature  so 
sweet  and  strong  and  sustaining  that  it  is  counted 
among  our  most  precious  experiences,  and,  once  over, 
laid  away  in  the  lavender  of  memory  forever.  And 
when  we  no  longer  see  through  a  glass  darkly,  but  face 
to  face,  it  may  then  become  plain  that  behind  the  grim 
look  and  the  chastisement  was  the  benign  countenance 
of  the  friend,  and  the  unspeakable  yearning  of  the 
mother  heart.  Irony,  in  the  last  analysis,  may  resolve 
itself  into  a  masked  good-will. 


Sbores  of  ©ur  Western  Sea 

LITTLE  Mr.  Pope  in  his  Twickenham  Villa 
wrote  not  seldom  about  grottoes  and  groves  and 
suchlike  denotements  of  Nature.  But  you  can  tell 
with  half  an  eye  that  he  did  not  care  about  them  really. 
There  is  no  love  in  his  treatment  of  natural  beauties: 
he  gives  us  a  purely  conventional  handling  of  such 
material.  We  must  wait  until  well  into  the  eighteenth 
century's  second  half  to  get  the  modern  note:  the  note 
of  Gray,  when  he  wrote  his  letters  descriptive  of  Al- 
pine scenery,  the  note  of  Burns  and  Crabbe  and  Words- 
worth,—  the  poets  who  ushered  in  the  splendid  new 
birth  of  modern  romantic  poetry,  which  included  the 
romantic  appreciation  of  sea  and  shore  and  sky. 

The  sea  and  the  inland  plains,  the  rolling  wooded 
country  and  the  lofty  hills — 'these  and  a  thousand 
other  manifestations  of  the  Nature  moods  which  make 
the  outer  world  a  breathing  miracle  of  delight  to  those 
whose  eyes  are  awake  —  came  into  English  literature 
in  our  own  day  as  never  before.  The  modern  reader 
can  listen  to  those  "  twin  voices,"  as  Coleridge  calls 
them,  of  the  sea  and  mountain,  and  when  he  seeks  them 
in  vacation  time,  can  receive  the  double  inspiration  of 
their  influence;  direct,  from  their  physical  appearance, 

28 


Sbores  of  <S>ur  Mestern  Sea 

indirect,  from  the  superb  descriptions  given  to  us  by 
the  great  writers. 

How  much  the  Hudson  River,  for  example,  owes  to 
Washington  Irving!  It  is  a  noble  stream,  in  any  case, 
and  certainly  was  when  the  red  man  strode  along  its 
banks  or  canoed  upon  its  placid  waters.  But  inter- 
wrought  with  Irving's  legendary  tales,  this  river  takes 
on  an  added  loveliness,  so  that  to  sail  upon  it  to-day 
stimulates  the  fancy  as  never  could  have  been  true  before 
the  time  of  the  Knickerbocker  author.  Similarly,  the 
lake  country  of  England  is  quite  another  locality  from 
what  it  was  before  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  and 
Southey  settled  there.  It  is  now,  and  will  be  for  all 
time  to  come,  clothed  in  a  magic  garment  of  poesy;  we 
see  it  through  a  glamorous  mist  of  imagination. 

Generally  speaking,  one  goes  to  the  sea  or  mountains 
as  an  alternative.  But  it  is  one  of  the  many  advantages 
of  the  Pacific  Coast  (where  this  paper  is  being  penned) 
that  you  get  the  two  in  close  conjunction  and  in  ex- 
citing contrast.  Westward,  is  the  ever-changing  ocean  ; 
to  the  east  the  foothills,  and  further  in  the  background 
the  sheer  purple  peaks,  snow-topped,  remote,  inacces- 
sible, virginal ;  while  between,  the  landscape  smiles  with 
orchards  and  orange  groves;  and  the  chromatic  varia- 
tions of  gold  and  green,  of  white  and  purple  and 
brown,  of  scarlet  and  lavender  and  gray,  are  such  as 
almost  to  intoxicate  a  person  whose  color-sense  has  been 
half-starved  in  other,  less-favored  regions. 

There  are  three  effects  of  Nature  alike,  in  that  they 
29 


Xtttle  3£s0ag5  In  ^Literature  ant>  Xtte 


are  all  grandiose,  and  on  an  impressive  scale:  those 
furnished  by  the  ocean,  the  plain,  and  the  mountain. 
Naturally,  they  have  evoked  corresponding  expression  in 
letters,  as  where  Byron  invokes  the  sea,  "  Roll  on,  thou 
deep  and  dark  blue  ocean,  roll,"  or  Coleridge  chants 
of  Chamouni,  or  our  own  Whitman  cries  up  the  great 
reaches  of  the  Far  West.  Personal  preferences  will,  of 
course,  give  the  palm  to  one  or  the  other  of  these 
mighty  exhibitions  of  Nature's  grandeur.  But  perhaps 
all  will  agree  that  there  is  more  of  the  steadfast  implied 
in  plain  and  mountain,  while  the  infinite  charm  and 
lure  of  the  sea  are  due  in  large  measure  to  the  protean 
habit  of  change. 

To  be  sure,  on  the  shores  of  the  western  sea,  it  is  the 
mood  and  aspect  of  calm  that  seems  dominant;  the 
Pacific,  true  to  her  name,  laps  the  sands  in  caressing 
susurrus  day  after  day  and  storms  are  remote  dreams 
rather  than  dire  realities.  Yet  we  know  that  this 
wilderness  of  water  can  arouse  herself  and  smite  and 
slay  and  then  easily  resume  her  deceitful  semblance  of 
languorous  rest. 

The  Pacific  is  the  more  satisfying  to  the  imagination 
in  that  she  is,  compared  with  the  traffic-dense  Atlantic, 
bare  of  sails  and  so  less  obstructed  in  the  great  horizon- 
sweeps  that  allow  man  to  use  the  sea  as  a  type  of  the 
Infinite.  Lonesome,  majestic,  untampered  with  by 
puny  man,  the  Pacific  is  the  sea,  par  excellence,  to  ex- 
press the  feeling  of  solitude  and  self-communion.  Of 
course,  this  is  appearance  rather  than  fact,  for  "  ten 

30 


Sbores  of  ©ur  TKftestern  Sea 

thousand  ships  sweep  over  thee  in  vain,"  but  the  im- 
agination lives  in  and  thrives  by  appearances,  so  that 
my  words  are  true. 

Then  by  their  proximity,  the  hills  are  all  the  more 
effective!  Meditating  by  the  waters,  with  your  face 
turned  to  the  west,  the  fancy  broods  on  the  mystery  of 
life,  your  own  small  life  in  relation  to  the  teeming  life 
of  fellow-man,  going  forth  as  it  does  upon  the  mighty 
waves  to  seek  some  haven  beyond  the  sky-line.  The 
solitary  gazer  associates  himself  with  his  kind.  Amid 
the  mountains,  however,  while  the  mood  again  is  one 
of  communion,  it  is  very  different;  there  is  less  of 
quiescence  and  revery  in  it,  more  of  the  tonic  of  sum- 
mons and  action.  And  clearly  it  is  more  individual- 
istic. To  look  up  to  the  high  hills,  the  Psalmist  knew 
when  he  added,  "  Whence  cometh  my  help,"  is  to  feel 
one's  smallness,  yet  to  get  a  kind  of  pleasure  in  that 
sense  of  personal  insignificance;  to  know  God  better 
as  humanity  shrinks  to  its  true  proportions. 

Yet  once  more,  between  the  remote  Sierras  and  the 
sea  stretches  the  desert,  vast,  yellow,  rapacious,  and 
deadly  hot.  Not  on  the  whole  round  earth  is  there  a 
more  striking  illustration  of  the  magic  wrought  by 
water  than  in  the  way  the  once  arid  coast  of  California, 
rainless  and  without  irrigation,  has  been  made  to  smile 
like  a  second  Eden  by  the  hand  of  man,  which  has  so 
used  this  precious  element  as  to  make  a  very  bower  of 
fruits  and  flowers  where  once  was  the  silence  of  desola- 
tion and  the  plummet  of  emptiness.  Really,  there  is 
31 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  SLife 

here  the  theme  for  an  epic  poem.  But  now  that  the 
miracle  has  been  accomplished,  there  is  still  the  fascina- 
tion of  the  arid  yellow  inland  landscape,  the  wide  sum- 
mer sweep  of  California  plains  which,  wanting  rain, 
glow  like  some  huge  topaz  and  offer  a  vivid  foil  to  the 
sumptuous  green  of  the  lands  under  cultivation. 
Winter  tourists  on  the  western  coast  miss  this  color 
note  so  beloved  of  painters,  which  gives  to  the  color- 
scheme  such  a  distinctive  value. 

The  sea,  the  plain,  and  the  mountain, —  go  to 
California  to  enjoy  them  and  get  the  triune  influence 
of  their  presence.  In  the  course  of  time,  the  incom- 
parable beauties  of  Nature  in  this  far-flung  barrier  to 
the  western  sea  will  get  full  expression  from  the  native 
makers  of  literature  even  as  already  much  has  come 
from  Twain  and  Stoddard  and  Harte,  from  Miller  and 
Norris  and  London,  from  Lummis  and  Muir  and 
Sterling,  and  from  many  more  of  the  younger  American 
school.  Here  is  a  magnificent  motif,  still  fresh  and 
provocative:  men  must  limn  these  wonders  between  sky 
and  sod,  between  brine  and  blue.  What  a  poor,  im- 
poverished thing  were  our  literature,  indeed,  did  not 
her  annals  increasingly  record  the  inspiration  of  woods 
and  waters,  and  hills  and  plains  and  prairies,  upon  the 
sensitive  spirit  of  man. 


Hgain  tbe  ®ol5en  Meatber 

IF  it  were  our  first  experience  of  it,  would  it  be 
more  or  less  beautiful  ?  one  wonders  on  these  golden 
days  of  October.  If  the  marvel  of  them  were  a  sur- 
prise instead  of  a  treasured  memory,  would  our  joy 
be  diminished  or  increased?  Perhaps  the  mingling  of 
expectation  and  fresh  delight  is  what  gives  the  October 
mood  its  richest  quality.  We  knew  it  would  come, 
since  it  always  has,  yet  we  were  not  quite  prepared  for 
the  mellow  perfection  of  its  look,  the  too-soon-departed 
splendor  of  its  spangled  hours.  To  know  autumn  at 
its  best  is  to  feel  that,  once  at  least  in  life,  anticipation 
is  no  cheat,  for  realization  even  beggars  our  dream  of 
the  truth. 

Nor  is  it  static  loveliness.  Little  by  little,  as  day 
follows  day,  there  is  an  added  keenness  in  the  air,  a 
winy,  crisp  flavor  to  one's  very  breathing;  the  yellows 
become  more  dominant,  the  reds  creep  in  to  make  the 
chromatic  gamut  more  variegated,  and,  so  gradually 
that  you  hardly  observe  it,  the  subtle  browns  and  grays 
and  sober  bronzes  temper  the  higher  coloring  and  lead 
on  to  that  ineffable  spiritual  quality  that  makes  No- 
vember, to  the  perceptive  soul,  the  most  suggestive 
month  of  the  year.  Melancholy  grows  with  the 

33 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

change,  yes ;  but  it  is  rather  the  memory  of  sorrow  than 
sorrow  itself;  or,  better,  it  is  the  sad  that  is  so  sweet 
as  to  pluck  the  sting  from  grief,  and  substitute  for  the 
inertia  of  loss  great  brooding  thoughts  of  peace  and 
of  fruition. 

Autumn  musings  are  thus  reminiscent  yet  fore-look- 
ing. It  is  as  though  Nature,  her  active  summer  work 
done,  sits  for  a  pleasure-while,  recalls  her  harvestings, 
and  is  satisfied;  and  then,  facing  the  winter  and  its 
dearth,  half-weary  but  content,  aware  that  with  the 
spring  her  power  shall  be  renewed  by  an  ancient  pact 
of  earth  and  sky,  smiles  dreamily  and,  not  unhappy, 
falls  on  sleep. 

Just  now  as  I  write,  the  green  and  gold  contend  in 
rivalry  for  the  landscape.  My  window,  which  gives  on 
a  southern  prospect,  shows  me  many  an  interweaving 
of  these  two  superb  color  notes ;  and  the  heavens  above, 
soft  yet  keen,  glitteringly  ashine,  and  sure,  as  evening 
approaches,  to  paint  the  west  with  luminous  miracles 
of  yellow  and  red  and  pink  and  the  intermediate  tints 
that  are  opaline  and  pearl-shot  and  dimmest  amethyst, 
recall  Wordsworth's  great  lines: 

Thou  dost  preserve  the  stars  from  wrong; 
And  the  most  ancient  heavens,  through  Thee,  are  fresh  and 
strong. 

It  seems  almost  cruel  that  October  is  but  a  brief 
fraction  of  the  cycle  of  the  months.  But  would  it  be 
so  dear  and  wonderful  were  it  a  more  frequent  visitant  ? 

34 


H0ain  tbe  <Boit>en  Meatbet 

After  all,  there  is  wisdom  in  the  alternation  of  the  sea- 
sons, and  man,  left  to  his  own  devices,  might  cheapen 
the  benisons  of  nature  by  demanding  them  at  will. 

How  deep  and  wholesome  the  lesson  October  teaches 
in  her  willingness  to  relax,  and  recall,  to  brood  and  lie 
fallow  for  a  little,  ere  the  work  is  resumed.  We  fussy 
mortals,  with  our  large-little  schemes,  our  nervous  hur- 
ryings  and  incoherent  hastes,  need  this  admonition  of 
the  fields  and  forests  in  their  autumn  semblance.  The 
temptation  always  to  work,  to  strive  for  something  de- 
sirable even  in  the  well-earned  vacationing,  is  a  uni- 
versal one,  and  nowhere  stronger  than  in  busy,  anxious, 
emulative  America.  And  rebuking  such  undue,  un- 
dignified worry,  the  eternal  processes  of  the  earth  offer 
us  a  sight  of  their  unhasting  sequences,  and,  in  a  sump- 
tuous mood  of  beauty,  remind  us  that  to  be  happy  is  to 
be  well  nourished,  as  Emerson  somewhere  says;  that 
just  to  lie  fallow,  and  dream,  may  be  to  do  the  work 
of  the  gods. 


35 


fiDan  an&  Societ? 


H 

THE  oldest  person  I  know,  and  the  sweetest,  is 
a  five-year-old  maid.  When  she  looks  at  me 
out  of  those  deep,  candid  eyes  of  hers,  and  rebukes 
with  a  grave  wonder  some  utterly  foolish  remark  I 
have  made  under  the  prick  of  social  necessity,  it  is  I 
who  feel  only  five,  while  she  seems,  as  to  wisdom,  of  an 
age  ineffable  and  beyond  compute. 

It  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  there  is  something 
very  eerie  about  children  in  their  knowingness;  they 
appear  to  speak  out  of  a  supreme  contempt  for  the 
evasions  and  shallownesses  of  grown-ups.  It  is  as  if 
the  accumulated  experience  of  the  race  were  stored  up 
in  them,  and  they  held  the  touchstone  which  infallibly 
separates  the  wheat  from  the  chaff  in  human  character. 
Hence  the  exceeding  silliness  of  "  talking  down  "  to 
a  little  one  who  looks  up  to  you  in  the  physical  sense, 
since  you  are  the  taller;  but  who  looks  down  on  you 
and  patronizes  you  from  a  height  of  spiritual  superiority 
that  is  beyond  plummet-line,  measure,  or  mark.  The 
mature  person  who  is  at  all  perceptive,  and  has  not 
forgotten  his  own  childhood  altogether,  thus  comes  to 
stand  in  very  awe  of  a  sweet,  winsome  wisp  of  a  girl 
such  as  my  five-year-old. 

39 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  SLife 

Do  not  misunderstand  me.  It  is  not  moral  only, 
this  influence  of  a  child,  but  intellectual;  or,  at  least, 
it  involves  more  than  being  better  than  I  am. 

I  stood  one  day,  well  along  toward  sunset,  in  the 
bay  window,  watching  the  western  sky  where  the 
Maker  of  all  things  was  marshaling  a  splendid  array 
of  colors  for  the  final  sun-flight. 

"It  is  beautiful,  isn't  it,  dear?"  said  I,  with  a 
banality  for  which  I  immediately  hated  myself. 

"  Yes,"  replied  my  five-year-old,  with  infinite  sober 
sweetness. 

Then  with  a  masterstroke  of  the  commonplace,  I 
added,  half  to  myself,  "  I  wonder  what  it  all  means?  " 
Whereupon,  those  eyes  were  turned  full  upon  me,  and 
as  I  shrank  from  their  compassionate  pity,  came  the 
words:  "  Why,  don't  you  know?  "  In  a  flash  I  stood 
confessed,  stripped  bare,  in  all  my  wretched  grown- 
upness ;  a  creature  staled  by  custom, —  so  many  sunsets 
had  I  seen !  —  ashamed  to  let  my  intuitions  divine  the 
truth,  set  in  the  vicious  habit  of  trying  to  prove  in- 
stead of  feeling  the  truth  and  being  nourished  by 
thoughts  that  "  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears." 

When  she  had  taught  me  a  salutary  lesson,  my  five- 
year-old  turned,  still  with  the  same  indescribable  sweet 
dignity,  walked  to  a  table,  took  up  a  book  and  became 
immersed  in  the  best  literature  in  the  world, —  fairy 
tales.  It  was  exactly  as  if  she  had  said  —  only  a  nicer 
way  of  saying  it  — "  Now  I  think  you  understand ;  ex- 
cuse me,  I  have  more  important  matters  than  your 
40 


* 

education  to  attend  to."  It  would  have  been  a  colossal 
mistake  had  I  made  any  reply ;  I  simply  sneaked  out  of 
the  room,  closing  the  door  very  softly  for  fear  of  break- 
ing the  revery  of  the  sedate  little  figure,  with  that 
"  spirit  small  hand  "  of  hers  propping  up  the  fair  white 
brow  and  the  stray  locks  of  burnished  hair  falling  over 
the  mobile  face. 

No  wonder  scientists  tell  us  that  the  child  is  the  race 
writ  small,  for  children  certainly  have  the  effect  of 
knowing  far  more  than  any  one  child  can,  so  far  as 
instruction  and  the  experience  drawn  from  their  brief 
sojourn  in  the  earthly  environment  go.  This  may  lead 
in  the  direction  of  mysticism,  but  I  care  not  whither  it 
lead,  since,  to  judge  from  personal  observation,  it  is  the 
honest  impression  made  upon  us  by  the  wee  inhabitants 
of  our  hearts  and  homes.  They  remind  me  constantly 
that  the  grown-up  tendency  is  to  play  a  part;  in  con- 
trast, they  seem  rooted  in  reality.  It  is  only  their  good 
breeding  which  keeps  them  from  openly  contemning 
our  foolish  assumption  of  roles,  the  hangdog  manner 
in  which  we  disport  ourselves  most  of  the  time.  When 
a  mature  human  being  lets  go  for  a  bit,  waxes  natural 
and  dares  to  be  himself,  he  is  sure  to  be  checked  by 
the  fatal  remark  from  another  sophisticate:  "Dear 
me,  don't  do  that,  you  act  as  if  you  were  only  ten," 
after  which  cold  douche  you  sheepishly  resume  your 
solemn  customary  mask,  and  go  cursing  on  your  way. 
During  that  brief,  beautiful,  dare-devil  moment  of  let- 
ting go,  you  may  be  despised  by  fool  grown-ups,  but  the 

41 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  aito  Xife 

children  love  you,  recognize  you  for  the  nonce  as  their 
equal ;  and  will  give  you  such  a  royal  time  of  it  as  shall 
make  the  return  to  mature  inhibitions  painful  indeed. 

Remember,  I  am  speaking  of  the  unspoiled  child. 
Double  the  years  of  my  beloved  five-year-old,  and  when 
she  has  attained  the  reverend  age  of  ten  she  will  begin 
to  obey  imitatively,  and  as  an  end  to  some  desired  result. 
She  will  not  have  her  queenlike  way  of  granting  a  favor. 
She  will  have  entered  into  more  intimate  relations  with 
others  and  have  lost  somewhat  of  that  distinctive,  fasci- 
nating personality  which  at  present  gives  her  both 
power  and  charm.  In  short,  she  will  be  further  along 
the  road  that  leads  to  maturity:  time  of  consciousness, 
convention,  and  caution. 

I  never  got  really  close  to  my  five-year-old  until  I 
treated  her  as  my  equal  in  general  knowledge,  and  im- 
mensely my  superior  in  everything  else.  This  once  con- 
ceded, we  were  instantly  on  comrade  terms  and  what  I 
(had  the  audacity  to  call  my  "  business  "  was  merely  a 
pretext  to  keep  me  busy  during  the  day,  while  she,  too, 
had  her  tasks  and  duties  until,  evening  come,  the  all 
too  brief  hour  before  bed  could  be  devoted  to  the  truly 
important  part  of  life :  games,  stories,  conversations,  the 
exchange  of  experiences  and  the  exercise  of  the  imagi- 
nation. Here  I  must  drop  aside  all  weariness  and,  with 
every  faculty  alert  and  my  best  foot  forward,  engage  in 
a  companionship  inexhaustibly  varied,  fresh,  delightful, 
and  instructive.  Often  I  went  into  it  like  a  clod,  and 
came  out  a  living  spirit.  My  fancy  had  been  dead,  it 

42 


H 

was  alive  again;  my  sense  of  romance  and  poetry  had 
slumbered,  and  once  more  it  was  quickened  into  joy- 
ous activity.  I  rejoiced  to  be  alive,  believed  in  myself 
and  my  fellow-beings,  knew  that  the  undying  boy  was 
still  in  me  waiting  for  the  call ;  and  above  and  beyond 
everything  else  realized  the  wonder  and  the  witchery 
of  maidenhood  whose  years  are  few  by  earthly  telling, 
but  whose  winsome  lore  is  big  with  reverberations  from 
the  stored-up  wisdom  of  all  past  time.  I  listen  to  the 
sweet  treble  of  my  five-year-old's  laughter,  yet  almost 
tremble  at  something  behind  it  that  takes  hold  on  the 
infinite,  and  hints  of  secrets  not  revealed  to  man. 

Think  not  that  this  child  is  exceptional.  Nay,  she  is 
not  mine  at  all,  nor  do  I  gaze  upon  her  with  the  fond, 
too  favorable  eye  of  parental  possession.  All  childhood, 
looked  at  aright,  has  this  higher  meaning,  this  mys- 
terious gift  of  presence  and  prescience,  this  magic  of 
suggestion  and  intuition.  While  we  "  teach  "  it  —  in 
our  boastful  grown-up  speech  —  we  may  let  it  teach  us 
too,  nor  be  afraid  to  sit  at  the  feet  of  babes  and  suck- 
lings. 


43 


3frten&  ant)  fl 

I  HAD  lost  my  friend,  and  I  went  my  ways,  dazed 
and  dry-eyed,  trying  to  forget,  always  remember- 
ing. I  repeated  to  myself,  for  the  comfort  of  their 
beauty,  Cory's  wonderful  lines,  in  which  the  poet  spoke 
once  and  for  all,  for  all  of  us,  voicing  the  wistful  pathos 
of  the  loss  and  lonesomeness  which  are  a  part  of 
human  destiny: 

They  told  me,  Heracleitus,  they  told  me  you  were  dead, 
They  brought  me  bitter  news  to  hear  and  bitter  tears  to  shed. 
I  wept,  as  I  remembered  how  often  you  and  I 
Had  tired  the  sun  with  talking  and  sent  him  down  the  sky. 

Then  one  day  I  found  myself  in  a  great  wood, 
gloomed  by  splendid  firs,  yet  gold-shot  by  shafts  of  sun 
that  pierced  transversely  the  scented  forest  aisles,  mak- 
ing an  alluring  arabesque  of  light-and-shade  before  my 
tardy  feet.  And  lo,  as  I  walked  on  in  meditation  so 
deep  and  sad  and  tender  as  to  be  unaware  of  bodily 
motion,  of  a  sudden  there  floated  to  me,  from  I  know 
not  what  aery  hidden  perch  in  the  tree  tops,  the  note 
of  the  hermit  thrush, —  sole  singer  of  spiritual  secrets, 
I  like  to  call  him,  of  all  the  tuneful  choir  of  our  west- 
ern world.  Instantly,  with  an  electric  insistence,  the 
44 


JFrienfc  an&  fl 

second  and  concluding  stanza  of  Cory's  poem  flooded 
into  my  mind: 

And  now  that  thou  art  lying,  my  dear  old  Carian  guest, 
A  handful  of  grey  ashes,  long,  long  ago  at  rest, 
Still  are  they  pleasant  voices,  thy  nightingales  awake; 
For  Death  he  taketh  all  away,  but  them  he  cannot  take. 

What  matter  whether  it  be  thrush  or  nightingale,  I 
thought  then,  the  one  loved  here  in  America,  the  other 
dear  across  the  great  water,  and  bound  up  with  the 
song  and  story  of  many  centuries?  For  with  both, 
Nature  speaks  through  the  mouth  of  a  bird,  and  man 
listens  and  receives  consolation.  There,  in  the  scented 
wood  way,  walking  upon  the  soft,  springy  carpet  of 
pine-needles,  and  catching  glimpses  of  the  summer  sky 
far  above,  while  my  lungs  drew  in  the  balsam-laden  air 
and  the  sough  of  the  wind  made  a  subtle  music  in  my 
ear,  I  knew,  with  a  knowledge  not  of  the  head  but  of 
the  heart,  that  my  friend  was  near,  and  held  converse 
with  me  after  the  sweet  old  fashion.  And  not  all  the 
scornful  wisdom  of  the  world  shall  ever  deprive  me 
of  that  moment  of  revelation  and  of  bliss. 

Nor  was  that  sylvan  drawing-nigh  to  the  friend 
unique ;  for  I  found  that  if  I  sought,  I  also  found ;  that 
some  lovely  Nature-note  or  mood  was  always  ready  and 
eager  to  act  as  intermediary  between  me  and  the  one 
behind  the  veil.  On  earth,  we  had  together  loved 
these  rare,  divine  moments  when  the  beauties  of  earth 
and  sky  and  all  that  lies  between  seized  upon  our  souls 
and  made  them  one  in  a  noble  experience.  And  so  now, 
45 


Xittle  Essays  in  literature  a^  !fcife 

if  but  the  moment  offered  and  the  mood  came,  came 
also  the  comrade  as  of  yore,  and  we  walked  and  talked 
together  as  if  the  "  unplumbed,  salt,  estranging  sea  " 
which  men  call  death  had  never  rolled  between  and 
seemingly  sundered  our  lives.  By  a  marvelous  identi- 
fication of  interest,  by  a  happiness  so  keen  that  it  had 
to  be  shared,  time  and  space  and  the  testimony  of  the 
eye  were  not,  and  only  the  love  that  binds  human  be- 
ings together  remained. 

That  day  in  the  wood,  when  I  came  to  a  little  clump 
of  white  birches,  most  spirituelle  of  all  forest  trees, 
even  as  the  firs  and  hemlocks  are  the  most  somber  and 
the  poplars  most  quiveringly  pathetic,  it  seemed  as  if 
my  friend  paused  and  spoke  of  those  elvish  creatures; 
for  did  he  not  care  for  them  in  special,  and  had  he  not 
written  many  a  lilting  line  that  limned  their  slender, 
white  perfection  and  hinted  at  the  symbol  of  their 
haunting  presence  ?  And  so,  side  by  side,  in  the  hidden 
healing  of  the  woods,  we  stood,  and  looked,  communed 
and  were  content. 

The  season  was  midsummer,  that  would  soon  merge 
into  early  autumn.  Hence,  the  rich  green  leaves  of 
the  laurel,  that  in  June  embowered  the  fragrant  blos- 
soms along  this  enchanted  road,  were  alone  a  witness 
to  earlier  flowering ;  but  all  who  know  the  laurel  along 
New  England  roadways  can  love  its  leaves  when  blos- 
soming is  over,  and  so  did  we,  there  in  the  scented  dusk, 
—  for  now  the  night  drew  on.  My  friend,  dear 
though  dead,  alive  because  loved,  stooped  to  pluck  a  bit 

46 


if  rtenfc  anfc  tf 

of  goldenrod,  and  held  it  up  high  in  his  grasp  against  the 
trees;  green  behind  gold,  gold  against  green;  with  his 
exquisite  color-sense,  I  knew  how  much  the  picture 
meant  to  him,  albeit  no  word  dropped  from  his  lips. 

A  little  later,  as  we  strolled  on  down  the  aisles  of 
early  evening,  and  began  to  see  through  the  pleached 
tree  tops  the  pale  silver  of  a  sickle  moon,  he  paused 
again  to  brood  tenderly  over  the  wild  aster,  whose 
delicate  purple  was  another  color-note  in  a  place  where 
the  sensitive  might  feast  upon  many  such  a  detail. 
And  I  saw,  not  without  tears,  how  the  poet  soul  of 
my  friend  spoke  to  that  beautiful  wilding  thing,  and 
how  it  gave  him  back  its  blessing  and  its  peace.  To 
both  of  us,  unspeakable  memories  were  interwoven  with 
these  common  wayside  blooms,  the  goldenrod  and  the 
aster;  overtones  out  of  the  past  they  sounded,  and 
undermeanings  they  held,  too  deep  to  fathom. 

Still  we  walked  on,  and  the  dusk  trembled  with  the 
reiterant  triple  note  of  the  thrush ;  so  shy  and  hid  and 
minor-cadenced  is  that  songster,  that  sundown  and 
afterglow  and  the  first  dovelike  revealings  of  the  night 
are  the  hours  to  hear  him ;  these,  rather  than  any  day- 
time mood.  And  as  the  bird's  silver,  delayed  music 
mourned  through  the  forest  and  seemed  like  a  harbinger 
of  the  promised  floodtide  of  moonlight,  lo,  my  friend, 
with  his  low,  sweet  voice,  his  aquiline  beauty,  and  his 
spirit  too  fine  for  the  harsh  uses  of  this  world,  faded  out 
from  my  ken  and,  for  that  time,  came  no  more. 

But,  moving  down  the  silvern  vistas  of  the  wood,  his 
47 


Xittle  Essays  tn  literature  an&  Xtfe 

touch  was  still  warm  upon  my  hand,  his  love  sustained 
me,  and  in  the  continued  plaint  of  the  hermit  thrush  I 
felt  his  presence  and  was  less  bereaved.  And  I  was 
aware  that  this  was  no  fantasy,  but  a  sane  excursion  of 
the  soul,  fortifying  me  for  the  more  homely  doings  that 
fill  my  days. 

Returning  from  the  vacation,  recalling  what  has 
been  seen  and  done,  it  is  natural  and  perhaps  not  un- 
fruitful to  think  these  autumn  thoughts,  and  to  wonder 
if  in  the  contact  once  again  with  Nature  in  our  leisure 
time,  we  have  drawn  nearer  to  the  mother  breast  and 
made  the  most  of  a  golden  chance,  so  becoming  re- 
vivified for  the  sober  working-year.  For  there,  in  the 
breathing  universe  of  which  the  sky  and  earth  are  like 
twin  walls,  there  is  a  comradeship  indeed,  and  a  solace 
that  no  shift  of  fortune  or  of  fate  can  take  away.  My 
friend  and  I  were  brought  together  by  that  voice,  the 
voice  for  us  that  sounded  through  the  thrush,  the  voice 
typified  in  Cory's  nightingales : 

For  Death  he  taketh  all  away,  but  them  he  cannot  take. 


©ut  of  CMR>boo& 

THE  man  herewith  recalls  a  sensational  event  out 
of  his  childhood.  His  father  returned  from  a 
trip  to  Florida,  bearing  with  him  a  mysterious,  small 
white  box,  long  for  its  size  and  perforated  with  air 
holes.  Arriving  in  the  early  morning,  he  came  into 
the  room  where  the  boy  was  dressing,  unscrewed  the 
top  of  the  box,  and  emptied  onto  the  floor  a  live  baby 
alligator. 

The  little  beast,  after  a  dazed  moment  or  two, 
began  to  crawl,  and  the  boy  took  to  the  nearest  chair 
with  an  instinctive  movement  that  had  in  it  no  ap- 
parent reasoning:  just  the  immediate,  spontaneous  phys- 
ical reaction  to  fear  and  astonishment  behind  which 
doubtless  are  occult  manceuvers  of  the  brain.  Trusting 
to  memory,  the  man  would  say  that  the  tiny  saurian, 
thus  abruptly  introduced  into  the  early  menage,  was 
perhaps  three  feet  in  length;  more  likely  he  was  but 
two;  alligators,  like  other  things,  grow  with  the  years 
and  the  telling.  But  he  was  big  enough  to  afford  a 
thrill  such  as  sets  that  day  apart  in  the  corridors  of 
memory  and  makes  it  worth  while  yet  to  re-live  it,  for 
its  romance  and  its  poetry.  That  alligator  (I  regret 
to  add  that  it  pined  away  in  the  bleak  northerly  air 
49 


Xittie  Essays  in  Xiterature  aito  %ife 

and  died  just  three  weeks  after  its  Floridian  hegira) 
stood  for  the  far  away,  the  unusual,  the  unexpected, 
the  imagined  but  never  before  seen ;  all  denotements  to 
arouse,  in  boy  or  man,  the  sentiment  that  makes  him 
tingle  with  a  sense  of  the  wonder  of  life. 

The  wonder  of  life,  there  you  are!  Does  it  still 
evoke  that  feeling  in  you,  at  least  now  and  again?  If 
not,  beware,  and  deceive  yourself  not:  you  may  be  but 
five  and  thirty,  with  a  clean  bill  of  health  from  the 
medical  authorities,  yet  you  are  to  all  intents  and  pur- 
poses dead,  yes,  deader  than  old  Marley,  than  whom 
was  ever  a  man  more  definitely  extinct?  If  to  you  the 
laws  of  nature  have  become  a  commonplace,  and  the 
characters  of  your  fellow-men  uninteresting;  if  there 
be  no  longer  a  stir  of  the  imagination  as  you  look  back 
to  your  alligator  (or  whatever  the  event  you  summon 
out  of  your  youth)  ;  if  history  seem  to  you  but  dry 
bones,  and  the  turmoil  and  passion  of  that  present 
history,  which  is  politics,  is  naught  but  a  sordid  game 
of  personal  ambition;  if  the  marvels  of  science  shake 
you  not  as  mortals  burrow  the  earth,  penetrate  the  sea 
or  sail  upon  the  great  winds  a  mile  high  in  the  air; 
if  (and  this  is  inconceivable)  there  is  no  vibrancy  and 
sweetness  for  you  in  the  voice  of  woman  heard  in  the 
moonlight  under  the  ancient  enchantment  of  glooming 
trees;  if  a  land  of  the  present  like  America  fail  to 
make  you  dream  of  a  future  so  mighty  in  achieve- 
ments as  to  beggar  speech  and  almost  baffle  prophecy, 
— then,  poor  soul,  are  you  but  a  galley  slave,  when  a 

50 


<S>ut  of 

king  you  might  be,  and  no  mortal  of  them  all  lying 
in  dreamless  dust  in  a  dateless  and  forgotten  tomb  is 
so  wretchedly  null  and  void  as  you!  For  with  them, 
they  had  the  chance  and  mayhap  took  it,  and  it  is  long 
over.  But  for  you,  with  the  chance  within  reach,  and 
with  your  blood  still  coursing  in  your  veins,  you  see 
nothing  around  or  above  or  within  you,  and  are  merely 
marking  time  instead  of  marching  with  the  great, 
eternal  procession  of  the  years  and  the  nations. 

Lucky  the  mortal  who  has  had  an  alligator  in  his 
youth  and  remembers  it.  Lucky  any  one  who,  beaten 
upon  by  the  cares  of  life  and  at  times  haggard  with  its 
responsibilities,  can  still  take  joy  in  a  sunset,  go  a-fish- 
ing  for  the  sake  of  the  outdoorness  of  it  as  well  as  for 
the  fish,  follow  the  "  National  Game  "  without  shame, 
laugh  at  a  clean  joke  from  the  lungs  instead  of  from 
the  throat, —  in  short,  one  who  has  preserved  a  capacity 
for  the  zest  of  living  and  can  command  upon  a  fit  occa- 
sion the  boy-like  mood.  Kill  the  instinct  for  joy  in  a 
mature  human  being  and  what  is  left  is  a  drudge,  a 
bore  or  a  criminal.  Remove  the  sense  of  poetry  from 
him,  as  in  a  hundred  ways  it  applies  to  life,  and  he  is 
like  a  traveler  who,  midway  upon  the  burning,  water- 
less desert  sands,  has  not  even  the  hope  of  the  green 
oasis  and  the  blessed  drink  beneath  the  pleasant  shade 
trees  far  away.  He  has  around  him  only  the  hopeless 
barrenness  of  the  desert. 

Man  is  a  creature  of  bread  and  meat  and  daily 
duties,  yes;  but  also  a  creature  of  dreams,  ideals,  of 


%ittle  JS&8%$8  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 


spangled  memories  and  immortal  forth-looking  faith. 
He  was  meant  to  work  in  the  gladness  of  his  heart  no 
less  than  in  the  sweat  of  his  brow.  If  he  do  not,  his 
doom  is  not  in  the  intention  of  the  Almighty  but  in 
the  mistakes  of  society. 


loafing 

j^ENNETH  GRAHAME,  essayist  of  charm  and 
-IV.  suggestion,  speaks  of  "  all  good  fellows  who  look 
upon  holidays  as  a  chief  end  of  life,"  and  adds  that, 
"  wisest  of  them  all,  the  Loafer  stands  apart,  supreme." 
You  observe  that  he  dignifies  him  with  a  capital,  as  if 
in  protest  at  the  cheap,  conventional  estimate  of  the 
type,  an  opprobrious  name  withal,  to  fit  a  drone  or 
blackguard.  For  Grahame,  however,  the  loafer  is  wise 
because  he  realizes  that  reflection  yields  a  richer,  more 
lasting  joy  than  action ;  that,  in  sooth,  the  latter  is  but 
a  preparation  for  the  "  subjective  pleasures  of  the 
mind."  And  the  true  loafer  is  possessed  of  such  a 
whimsical  turn  of  mind,  and  so  well  dowered  with 
humor,  as  to  derive  the  more  zest  from  the  opinion  of 
him  cherished  by  the  Philistine,  who  looks  upon  the 
other  as  a  cumberer  of  the  earth,  an  economic  failure, 
to  be  hounded  into  jails  and  workhouses,  and  a  theme 
for  admonition  and  warning. 

The  loafer  we  have  in  mind  —  the  loafer  whom  Gra- 
hame sings  —  is  no  tramp,  nor  wastrel,  nor  yet  a  man 
who  dodges  duty.  No,  he  is  a  sane  soul  who  works 
hard,  yet  leaves  a  margin  for  play,  and  in  his  play  is 
sportively  a  boy  again ;  he  knows  that,  so  far  from  wast- 

53 


Xittle  JEssass  in  ^literature  anfc  Xife 

ing  time,  he  is  renewing  his  whole  life  and  that  in  the 
very  relaxation  lies  the  strength  to  key  up  once  more 
for  the  more  active  business  of  life.  The  Stradivarius 
which  is  never  unstrung  —  so  runs  his  thought  —  will 
lose  its  incomparable  tone.  He  knows,  too,  that  in  his 
apparent  idleness  and  aimless  lounging  may  be  hidden 
processes  of  assimilation  and  absorption,  precious  in- 
deed for  his  highest  welfare,  his  finest  usefulness  for 
fellow-men.  He  has  learned  the  secret  phrased  by 
Horace  centuries  ago,  that  it  is  wise  to  fool  in  season. 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  than  whom  no  man  of  his 
generation  worked  more  valiantly  against  greater  odds, 
wrote  one  day  toward  the  end  of  his  life  thus  whim- 
sically to  a  friend :  "  I  sometimes  sit  and  yearn  for 
anything  in  the  nature  of  an  income  that  would  come  in 
—  mine  has  all  got  to  be  gone  and  fished  for  with  the 
immortal  mind  of  man.  What  I  want  is  the  income 
that  really  comes  in  of  itself,  while  all  you  have  to  do 
is  just  to  blossom  and  exist  and  sit  on  chairs."  And 
he  goes  on  to  say  that,  under  such  conditions,  "  I  should 
probably  amuse  myself  with  works  that  would  make 
your  hair  curl, —  if  you  had  any  left." 

Here  we  get  close  to  the  truth.  In  an  ideal  state, 
work  would  not  be  for  wage,  but  for  the  spontaneous 
and  pleasurable  expression  of  personality.  And  it  is 
safe  to  say  that  the  bulk  of  the  world's  best  work  has 
been  done  in  that  spirit.  Dr.  Grenfell  tells  us  that 
there  is  no  sacrifice  in  his  bleak,  splendid  Labrador 
service ;  he  is  simply  having  a  good  time,  doing  what  he 

54 


Xoafino 

best  likes  to  do;  and  all  the  more  we  honor  the  service 
which  he  renders,  and  admire  the  man. 

The  only  real  loafer,  then,  is  the  man  who,  because 
he  can  work  hard  as  well,  can  appreciate  the  loafing; 
and  who  recognizes,  in  the  seeming  laziness,  the  filling 
of  an  empty  well  with  the  waters  of  life.  The  hobo 
is  no  genuine  loafer,  for  the  sufficient  reason  that  he 
works  hard  at  it,  and  has  lost  the  taste  of  pleasure  it 
should  contain.  Hence  do  we  regard  him  with  oblique 
gaze,  as  an  enemy  of  society.  Why  should  we  honor 
any  man  who,  having  elected  a  profession,  finds  no  re- 
ward in  it  ?  If,  passing  along  a  country  road,  I  should 
come  upon  a  group  of  tramps  sitting  about  a  fire  at 
their  ease  and  singing  some  rollicking  stave,  I  would 
feel  a  certain  respect  for  them;  it  would  be  a  symbol 
of  joy  in  the  hardest  job  on  earth, —  doing  nothing  as 
a  profession.  But  did  any  one  ever  hear  such  a  song? 

Walt  Whitman,  in  famous  words,  has  extolled  the 
virtue  of  loafing  and  inviting  our  souls.  His  mean- 
ing goes  deep  into  the  roots  of  living.  Here  is  the 
true-blue,  culminating  validation  of  that  mood  which, 
to  the  outer  eye  a  mere  indulgence  in  inertia,  may  be  to 
that  inner  eye  which  sees  the  soul  of  things,  the  most 
important  functioning  of  a  life.  Truly,  we  need  that 
hour,  day,  week,  or  year;  not  for  rest,  refreshment, 
recreation  alone,  good  as  they  are,  but  to  take  stock 
of  ourselves  spiritually,  to  get  on  speaking  terms  with 
our  higher  selves,  to  realize  that  we  are  made  in  the 
image  of  God.  The  mood  of  seeming  idleness  invites 
55 


Xfttle  Bssaps  in  ^Literature  anfc  %ife 

the  soul,  because  for  the  nonce  we  drive  from  mind  the 
practical  business  which  commonly  holds  us  in  an  iron 
grip,  and  makes  reflection,  readjustment,  and  new  valu- 
ations impossible;  into  the  mind,  thus  clarified,  and  so 
made  hospitably  open  for  better  things,  flow  the  sweet 
and  potent  influences  of  the  spirit. 

There  is  your  loafer,  sublimated  and  so  justified. 
Away  with  the  shallow  definition  of  the  dictionary! 
Wise  is  he  who  preserves  the  spirit  of  loafing  as  an 
avocation,  even  as  he  is  foolish  who  makes  it  a  vocation. 
Emerson,  in  this  sense,  was  one  of  the  superb  loafers 
of  American  life  and  letters.  He  walked  the  Concord 
woods  or  beside  her  streams  with  his  mind  inward  bent, 
in  that  delightful  mood  which,  as  Wordsworth  has  it, 
"  is  the  bliss  of  solitude."  I  daresay,  to  the  inhabitants 
of  the  town  he  sometimes  looked  idle,  a  sort  of  high- 
class  vagrant.  But  he  was  ever  about  his  own  business, 
and  it  was  a  very  important  one,  as  we  now  regard  it 
and  him.  He  dared  to  loaf  and  let  in  supernal  visitors ; 
he  was  sensitive  to  the  call  not  of  earth;  and  so  he 
hitched  his  wagon  to  a  star. 

In  overactive  America,  we  are  prone  to  wax  apolo- 
getic for  any  "  time  out."  We  must  remember  that 
time  out  may  be  eternity  in.  We  must  have  the 
courage  of  our  convictions  and  when  we  know  that  the 
clock  has  struck  and  the  loafing  hour  is  fairly  come,  not 
be  shamed  from  using  it  by  mere  outward  appearance, 
that  tyrant  over  us  all.  "  I  have  worked,"  the  wise  one 
should  reply,  "  long  and  dutifully,  in  order  that  this 

56 


hard-won  sacred  hour  might  be  granted  me;  it  is  here, 
and  I  shall  use  it  to  my  best  advantage,  benignantly 
unconcerned,  even  if,  to  my  neighbor,  I  seem  to  misuse 
an  opportunity."  And  he,  on  his  side,  should  adopt  the 
principle  of  '  live  and  let  live ' ;  he  needs  the  charitable 
interpretation,  even  as  do  you.  Avaunt  the  thought 
that  the  idle  man,  as  we  call  him,  is  one  who  works  not 
when  the  harvest  is  ripe;  perchance  he  gleans  in  fields 
as  fruitful  as  was  that  of  Boaz  to  the  alien  Ruth.  It 
may  well  be  that,  at  the  very  moment  when  his  vacant 
eye  seems  to  be  fixed  on  nothing,  he  is  seeing  visions 
that  in  the  fullness  of  time  shall  save  a  nation.  See 
that  you  have  vision,  lest  the  people  perish. 

Long  live  the  loafer  who  does  not  abuse  his  privilege, 
nor  invite  other  than  lofty  company  into  the  secret 
places  of  his  soul!  His  is  the  authentic  activity  that 
is  more  than  muscular,  and  his  reward  is  richer  than 
can  be  computed  in  any  coin  of  the  realm. 


57 


©K>  Hge 

THE  tragedy  of  growing  old  is  that  you  feel  so 
young.  Many  a  middle-aged  person  has  become 
amazedly  aware  of  this.  To  say  that  a  man  is  as  old 
as  he  feels  and  a  woman  as  she  looks,  is  not  to  get 
quite  to  the  root  of  the  matter.  If  a  man  carries  his 
years  in  his  face,  the  community  credits  him  with  them, 
however  much  he  may  skip  about  and  ape  inimitable 
youth.  And  as  for  the  other  sex,  to  declare  that  ap- 
pearance settles  the  matter  opens  the  door  to  the  temp- 
tation of  assisting  nature  with  art,  hiding  maturity 
behind  make-up.  Psychologically,  both  sexes  are  on  a 
par  as  to  age.  Whether  man  or  woman,  if  the  spirit 
of  youth  be  within,  its  outward  expression  in  face  and 
form  will  follow,  and  joyously  set  back  the  clock  of 
Time. 

The  deadly  thing,  almost  more  aging  than  age  itself, 
is  the  insidious,  creeping  knowledge  that  the  months 
fly,  the  years  move  on  apace,  and  all  of  us,  willynilly, 
are  older  by  every  ticktock  of  the  clock  and  revolution 
of  the  seasons.  To  brood  upon  it  is  to  wax  morbid, 
perhaps  pessimistic.  I  am  tempted  to  say  that  what 
we  call  old  age  is  thus  a  biologic  condition  plus  a  state 
of  mind.  In  other  words,  self-consciousness  plays  a 

58 


definite  part  in  bringing  about  "  this  drooping  gait, 
this  altered  size,"  as  Coleridge  has  it,  and  "  this  body 
that  does  me  grievous  wrong  "  has  been  influenced  by 
the  bodeful  dwelling  upon  its  slow,  sad,  inevitable 
approach.  I  believe,  therefore,  that  it  would  be  a 
mighty  good  thing  if  we  did  not  tell  off  our  age  by 
months  and  years  at  all,  and  kept  no  track  of  the  pas- 
sage of  time,  so  far  as  we  are  personally  concerned.  It 
is  the  attitude  of  the  community  which  develops  in  us 
this  sickly  tally-keeping,  whereby  we  are  aware  that 
to-day  we  are  forty  or  fifty  or,  alas,  sixty  years  of 
age! 

Suppose,  by  the  common  consent  of  men,  a  certain 
terminal  of  year-counting  were  set  up:  say,  thirty-five. 
Thereafter,  we,  the  community,  agree  to  count  our  ages 
backward :  being  thirty- four  at  thirty-six,  and  so  follow- 
ing. At  forty-five,  you  will  observe,  we  should  be 
twenty-five,  positively  coltish  in  feeling  and  no  doubt 
in  appearance,  for  the  psychological  effect  of  this 
thoroughly  rational  arrangement  would  be  tremendous. 
This  plan  would  be  an  improvement,  I  take  it,  even 
upon  the  state  of  mind  induced  by  not  knowing  your 
age  at  all,  a  condition  sometimes  seen  in  the  persons 
of  very  old  colored  folk,  who  have  lost  the  count  long 
since,  and  who  —  notice  —  are  invariably  a  hundred  or 
so  years  old.  But  the  plan  proposed  is  better  still, 
because  we  are  not  only  holding  Time  back,  but  we  are 
actually  growing  younger  all  the  while. 

Do  not  be  so  foolish  as  to  call  this  idea  whimsical; 
59 


Xittle  Essays  tn  Xiterature  arto  Xtfe 

it  is  a  fine  example  of  the  higher  commonsense,  and 
I  am  proud  of  it.  Remember  that  the  new  thing  is 
not  necessarily  idiotic;  by  the  new  thing  the  world 
advances.  Any  mind  that  is  open  wider  than  a  mouse- 
trap can  grasp  the  fact  that  we  are  all  victims,  more  or 
less,  of  the  social  conscience  and  consciousness,  meekly 
walking  our  ways  in  accordance  with  their  tyrannous 
decrees.  Surely,  in  nothing  is  this  truer  than  in  the 
absurd  and  hideous  conventions  of  age. 

What  woman  dare  face  her  dressmaker  when  the  lat- 
ter remarks,  "  I  think  that  would  be  a  little  young  for 
you?"  Or  what  man,  forsooth, —  although  man  pre- 
tends to  be  indifferent  to  such  fussy  distinctions, —  will 
not  hesitate  when  the  salesman  declares  oracularly, 
"  Yes,  it  is  a  nice  piece  of  goods,  but  really,  you  know, 
that  garment  belongs  in  the  boys'  department."  It  may 
be  the  best  fitting  and  most  becoming  thing  in  the  place, 
but  you  humbly  turn  away  and  take  some  ugly  pattern 
suitable  to  your  calendar  record.  Ah,  me,  many  are 
the  varieties  of  slavery  here  on  earth! 

Even  as  society  is  now  constituted  there  are  allevia- 
tions not  a  few.  Science  and  civilization  have  so  pro- 
longed man's  age  that  we  all  average  longer  lives  than 
we  did  some  centuries  ago,  and  some  of  us  live  longer 
than  we  want  to.  Moreover,  besides  living  longer  in 
actual  enumeration  of  time,  we  keep  younger  while  liv- 
ing,— "  are  in  it,"  as  the  saying  is,  far  beyond  the  con- 
ventional limits  set  up  by  earlier  killjoys.  Men  like 
Gladstone  and  Lord  Kelvin  were  doing  work  of  im- 
60 


mense  value  to  the  world  when  past  eighty ;  the  Psalm- 
ist's allotment  of  years,  being  seventy,  is  laughed  to 
scorn,  and  a  man  like  Dr.  Holmes  was  hailed  by  all 
who  knew  him  as  eighty  years  young. 

Women,  who  by  the  old  dispensation  were  dead  and 
done  for  by  thirty,  are  mere  social  infants  now  at  that 
age;  Balzac  discovered  the  social  possibilities  of  the 
woman  of  thirty,  a  new  type  in  his  hands.  Within  per- 
sonal observation,  the  woman  of  forty  has  been  accepted 
in  literature  —  sure  mirror  of  social  thought  and  feeling 
—  and  it  is  common  enough  in  drama  and  fiction  to 
see  that  mature  age  made  attractive  and  entirely  con- 
gruous in  the  depiction  of  love  between  the  sexes. 

In  Parker's  charming  play,  "  Rosemary,"  a  man  of 
forty  in  love  with  a  girl  in  her  teens  is  the  hero,  and 
all  the  sympathy  of  the  audience  is  his.  Nay,  a  much 
more  striking  example  of  the  way  we  are  pushing  for- 
ward the  age-limit,  whether  for  love  or  work,  is  to  be 
found  in  Bernstein's  play,  "  The  Attack,"  wherein  a 
man  of  fifty-three  is  loved  and  proposed  to  by  a  very 
young  girl.  A  generation  ago,  this  situation  could  only 
have  been  regarded  as  humorous;  now  it  occurs  in  a 
piece  of  serious  import.  There  is  a  widespread  senti- 
ment to-day  expressed  in  the  line  of  the  darky  song: 
"  I'se  goin*  to  live,  anyhow,  till  I  die,  die,  die." 

It  is  realized  that  the  fundamental  technic  of  living 

is  in  learning  to  make  the  most  of  the  present  gift  of 

earth  life,  and  to  last  in  it  as  long  as  you  can,  as  young 

as  you  can,  with  most  enjoyment  to  yourself  and  most 

61 


Xittie  Bssass  in  ^Literature  anfc  3Life 


usefulness  to  others.  A  this-world  commonsense  has 
been  developed  under  the  regime  of  science.  Gradually, 
but  with  evidently  increasing  courage,  we  are  refusing  to 
be  killed  before  our  time,  or  to  be  set  aside  ere  our  use- 
fulness or  attraction  is  over,  or  to  be  intimidated  into  a 
state  of  up-stage  retirement  when  the  pulses  still  beat 
strong  and  Life  beckons  yet  with  infinite  sweet  promises. 
We  have  rebelled  against  so  mechanical  a  thing  as  the 
stroke  of  the  hour  or  a  mere  word  registered  in  the 
family  Bible.  We  resent  the  impudent  questions  asked 
by  all  sorts  of  people,  whose  business  seems  to  offer 
an  excuse,  with  regard  to  our  length  of  years.  After 
all,  it  is  our  business,  not  theirs,  and  if  we  will  only 
believe  it,  the  matter  lies  in  our  own  hands. 

"  Avaunt,  all  such  harpies,"  I  cry.  "  It  is  nobody's 
affair  how  old  I  am,  and  if  you  wish  to  estimate  my 
time  of  life,  watch  my  actions,  observe  my  many  activi- 
ties of  body  and  mind,  and  so  judge." 

Let  us  all  adopt  the  pleasant  advice  :  "  The  moment 
you  feel  too  old  to  do  a  thing,  do  it  at  once." 


62 


%ure  of  Ibappinees 

T  TAPPINESS  is  the  bluebird  which  ever  lures  man 
•••  •*•  on,  elusive,  escaping,  always  beyond  his  grasp. 
Joy,  content,  pleasure,  these  are  his  as  a  mood  or  a 
moment,  again  and  again  during  his  human  experience. 
But  happiness,  which  means  a  permanent  condition  or 
state,  is  not  his,  nor  intended  to  be.  When  he 
finds  the  good  or  the  beautiful  dear  and  desirable,  it  is 
because  he  recognizes  it  as  fleeting,  a  thing  that 
beckons  him  onward,  a  lure  toward  perfection,  not  of 
earth,  or  at  least  not  at  present  on  earth.  Thus 
beauty,  of  whatever  kind,  is  a  promise  of  happiness 
and  holiness;  not  a  state  to  be  completely  realized,  but 
a  splendid  ideal  to  be  striven  for,  with  the  hope  of  a 
final  destination  where  only  the  holy  shall  abide. 

Our  forefathers  had  a  sense  of  this  when,  in  framing 
the  United  States  Constitution,  they  named  "  Life, 
Liberty  and  the  pursuit  of  Happiness  "  as  the  triple 
aim  of  man,  government  being  the  machinery  to  assist 
him  in  the  attainment  of  these  privileges.  It  was  the 
pursuit,  not  the  acquirement,  of  happiness  which  was 
set  up  as  an  end :  an  end  in  itself,  since  that  will-o'-the- 
wisp  is  never  quite  caught. 

Stevenson,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  declared  that  he 
63 


Xittle  Bssags  in  ^Literature  anfc  3Life 

had  known  many  a  delight,  that  joy  had  often  been 
his, —  he  learned  the  great  lesson,  too,  that  "  the  spirit 
of  delight  comes  on  small  wings," —  yet  he  affirmed 
he  had  never  grasped  happiness.  These  are  significant 
words,  coming  from  a  man  who,  conspicuous  in  his 
generation,  loved  life,  enjoyed  it  to  the  full  and  in  all 
his  writings  cried  up  the  idea  that  it  was  richly  worth 
while.  His  remark,  therefore,  was  not  pessimistic  or 
cynical,  although  superficially  it  might  be  taken  as  the 
expression  of  disillusionment.  It  was  rather  his 
philosophic  reminder  that  life  was  so  constituted,  and 
happiness,  in  the  scheme  of  things,  a  desideratum,  a 
dream,  never  a  mere  fait  accompli. 

There  are  two  ways  of  receiving  this  fact:  we  may 
challenge  the  ordering  of  the  universe,  call  it  arbitrary 
and  cruel;  or  assume  that  there  is  a  salutary  meaning 
in  it  all,  and  hence  seek  for  the  answer.  Those  with 
voice  and  vision  have  inclined  to  the  latter  mind. 
Maeterlinck,  in  the  charming  play  of  child-life  and 
fairy  lore  which  has  been  giving  pleasure  to  so  many 
folk  throughout  this  country,  is  one  such  interpreter. 
He  recognizes  the  elusive  character  of  the  pursuit  of 
happiness,  along  with  the  universality  of  the  attempt; 
the  children,  lad  and  lassie,  who  for  a  dream-year  seek 
the  bird  that  is  blue  (until  caught),  stand  for  the 
human  race ;  we  are  all  like  that,  whatever  be  our  par- 
ticular conception  of  happiness.  Again  and  again  do 
the  children  reach  out  their  hands  to  take  the  bird, 
but  ever  it  eludes.  Cage  it  and  it  escapes,  or,  looked 


%ure  of  Dappiness 

at  the  second  time,  begins  to  fade  from  its  cerulean  hue 
to  one  more  dull  and  drablike. 

When  the  dream  is  over,  and  the  children  under  the 
kindly  guidance  of  Light,  who  is  vision,  are  returned 
to  their  humble  home,  lo!  the  poet-dramatist  would 
say  to  us  that  the  bird  of  happiness  is  there,  was  there 
all  the  time  in  those  familiar  and  homely  surroundings ; 
overlooked,  it  may  be,  because  we  fondly  imagined  that 
a  thing  so  supernal  and  fair  could  not  be  near  at  hand, 
a  matter  of  everyday  experience.  Of  deep  significance 
in  the  treatment  is  it,  that  when  Tyltyl  gives  his  pet 
dove  to  the  sick  child  of  a  neighbor, —  in  other  words, 
does  a  deed  of  loving-kindness, —  his  dove  turns  blue 
and  seems  to  be  the  very  bird  they  have  so  long  sought. 
Yet  he  escapes  by  an  accident,  and  in  truth  must;  for, 
otherwise,  the  allegory  were  not  consistent.  It  would 
be  a  false  teaching  of  life  if  that  desirable,  yearned- 
for  bird  should  pause  for  long  in  its  flight,  were  more 
than  momently  retained. 

Here,  it  would  seem,  we  get  the  clue  to  the  secret. 
Happiness,  a  desire  of  the  eyes,  a  dream  of  the  soul,  is 
placed  before  us  in  order  that,  by  the  slow  process  of 
living,  we  may  learn  to  distinguish  between  the  joy  that 
is  fleeting  and  of  the  flesh,  and  that  which  is  permanent, 
high  and  pure.  Life,  with  this  in  mind,  may  be  defined 
as  a  series  of  discoveries  and  rejections:  the  rejection  of 
second-class  happinesses,  and  the  discovery  of  the  higher 
happiness  which  alone  satisfies  and  abides.  That  su- 
preme joy  is  seen  by  the  artist  as  Beauty,  and  so  he  hails 

65 


Xittie  3£00a$s  in  Xtterature  anfc  Xife 

it;  by  the  religionist  as  the  Good,  and  he  bows  down 
before  it  in  worship;  and  by  the  philosopher  as  the 
Eternal  Truth,  and  austerely  he  holds  it  before  men  as 
the  one  perfect  and  holy  thing.  But  in  the  guise  of 
happiness  each  member  of  this  trinity  must  come,  and 
to  the  thinker  they  are  but  phases  of  the  one  indivisible 
principle. 

Happiness,  then,  is  made  a  winged  and  wandering 
creature  to  lure  us  on  in  an  everlasting  chase  for  per- 
fection. It  is  the  great  stimulant  of  ideals,  for  the  rea- 
son that  it  suggests  in  a  world  so  broken,  imperfect,  and 
unsatisfactory,  another  state,  or  condition,  wherein  the 
gleam  becomes  steady  daylight  and  the  ineffable  promise 
a  realized  possession.  A  man  without  ideals  is,  in  the 
deepest  sense,  dead.  Happiness  is  used  as  a  lure, —  first 
a  mere  bauble  of  pleasure;  then,  gradually  it  changes 
until  it  becomes  the  bright  particular  jewel  of  our  souls 
which  shall  take  our  attention  away  from  the  gauds  and 
jimcracks  of  earth  and  set  our  contemplation  upon  the 
things  of  the  spirit.  Happiness  and  the  undying  hope 
it  breeds  find  their  justification  here. 

What  a  comforting  light  this  truth  sheds  upon  a 
myriad  of  the  pathetic  scenes  of  earth!  The  love,  set 
upon  the  friend  who  must  be  lost,  is  translated  to  a 
higher  love  which,  without  the  long  training,  could  not 
have  been.  The  frustrate  plan,  so  dear  to  the  im- 
agination, so  desired,  so  worked  for  through  years 
so  long,  has  left  in  the  soul  the  priceless  treasure  of 
character  and  conduct ;  it  needed  the  plan  to  bring  it  to 

66 


ZTbe  Xurc  ot  happiness 

a  rounded  strength.  The  sad  revelation  of  treachery 
in  the  trusted  mate  only  directs  the  mind  to  a  state 
where  there  shall  be  no  shadow  of  turning.  The  many 
bitternesses  that  come  because  the  cherished  wish  lies 
stillborn  before  us,  are  seen  to  be,  in  the  homely 
phrase,  but  blessings  in  disguise  in  the  course  of  the 
years :  if  unworthy,  they  are  well  forgotten ;  if  worthy, 
we  witness  their  translation  into  a  higher  ideal. 

It  is  one  of  the  many  merits  of  a  piece  of  literature 
like  Maeterlinck's  "  The  Blue  Bird  "  that  these  deep 
truths  of  life  are  implicit  in  the  story,  and  that  the 
philosopher  is  behind  the  poet,  teaching  us  while  he 
gives  us  innocent  pleasure  by  music,  stage  spectacle,  and 
the  joy  of  contact  with  the  simple  things  of  youth  and 
the  magic  things  of  the  young  imagination.  Such  a 
play  is  indeed  a  welcome  visitant  to  any  city,  for  it 
leaves  an  influence,  pervasive  and  strong,  though  not 
tangibly  appreciable,  long  after  the  beautiful  fairy 
fantasy  may  have  faded  from  our  memory. 


He  ©tbers  See  IBs 

NOBODY  ever  sees  his  own  face  in  the  glass. 
What  he  observes  there  is  a  compound,  divided 
into  three  parts:  one  part  himself  as  he  really  is,  one 
part  representing  what  he  expects  to  see,  and  a  third 
part  what  he  wishes  to  behold.  Self-esteem  gets  be- 
tween us  and  the  truth  in  suchwise  as  to  blind  us 
forever  to  the  facts.  Did  you  ever  have  the  awful 
experience  of  walking  into  a  full-length  mirror,  on  the 
assumption  that  it  was  a  vista  and  the  disagreeable- 
looking  person  coming  towards  you  another  than  your- 
self? As  he  approaches,  you  size  him  up  with  the 
cool,  aloof  glance  which  you  direct  upon  strangers  in 
general;  on  the  whole,  you  do  not  at  all  like  his  de- 
portment, gait,  or  general  semblance.  Suddenly,  with 
a  genuine  shock,  having  arrived  close  to  the  all-re- 
vealing yet  deceptive  glass,  you  discover  the  ill-favored 
stranger  to  be  yourself, —  and  it  takes  you  weeks  to 
get  over  it.  For  the  nonce,  you  really  have  seen  your- 
self as  others  see  you.  And  you  mutter,  "  Never 
again!" 

Dr.  Holmes  in  "  The  Autocrat "  tells  us  there  are 
six  personalities  involved  in  a  dialogue  between  John 
and  Thomas :  the  real  John,  known  only  to  his  Maker  ; 

68 


Hs  ©tbers  See 

John's  ideal  John,  and  Thomas'  ideal  John,  who  is 
never  the  real  John ;  and  the  same  three  with  reference 
to  Thomas.  This,  it  will  be  observed,  makes  any 
conversation  betwixt  two  human  beings  a  pretty  com- 
plex affair;  it  gives  one  a  sobering  sense  of  the  subtle 
difficulty  of  understanding  each  other  and  the  futility 
of  making  trustworthy  estimates  of  our  fellow-mortals. 

For,  notice  that  on  top  of  the  mistakes  inevitably 
made  by  John  about  Thomas  and  by  Thomas  about 
John  must  be  piled  the  blunders  the  community  will 
make  regarding  both,  not  only  as  a  community,  but  as 
countless  judgments  of  the  individuals  which  make 
up  society.  The  mind  fairly  staggers  before  the 
mathematics  suggested  by  the  mere  statement  of  these 
reactions  and  interactions.  Add  to  this  the  element  of 
time,  because  opinions  shift  with  time's  passing,  and 
the  inconstancy  of  human  estimates  becomes  all  the 
more  impressive.  If  it  is  practically  impossible  for  a 
human  being  to  know  himself  because  of  the  blinding 
of  selfhood,  and  still  more  impossible  to  know  others 
who  are  contemporary,  what  likelihood  is  there  of  any 
accuracy  in  the  attempts  to  depict  characters  in  the 
past? 

This  is  where  a  certain  skepticism  concerning  histor- 
ical estimates  is  bred  in  one  who  realizes  the  situation. 
From  all  available  sources  —  and  new  material  is  often 
offered  to  necessitate  a  change  of  opinion  —  the  student 
of  the  past  tries  to  reconstruct  the  picture  of  some 
human  being  who  has  been  of  importance  in  the  world's 

69 


OLittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

development:  Alexander,  Napoleon,  Henry  VIII, 
Lincoln.  The  acts  of  this  person  are  studied  as  they 
are  reported  in  contemporary  records;  the  diverse 
judgments,  passed  upon  him  by  those  of  his  own  day, 
are  gathered  and  collated;  attempt  is  made  to  get  a 
sense  of  the  general  feeling  of  the  community  con- 
cerning him,  if  any  such  definite  drift  of  judgment  can 
be  discovered.  His  letters,  if  any  exist,  are  eagerly 
read,  and  the  letters  he  received  from  others ;  the  petty 
ana  of  the  day  are  sifted  with  a  fine-tooth  comb  in  the 
hope  of  new  facts,  additional  light.  Then,,  bringing 
these  scattered  shreds  of  information  together  in  a 
synthesis  that  really  looks  quite  imposing,  the  historian 
proudly  draws  his  character  sketch,  and  it  seems  satis- 
factory and  convincing, —  until  another  specialist  comes 
along  to  knock  the  picture  into  a  cocked  hat  and  give 
the  world  one  that  may  be  as  much  guesswork  as  the 
other ! 

Of  course,  the  difficulty  grows  apace  just  in  propor- 
tion as  you  go  back  in  time;  the  records  become 
scanter,  the  testimony  harder  to  get,  the  accurate  trans- 
mission of  facts  less  certain.  And  so  history,  so  far 
as  it  deals  with  the  description  of  personality,  might 
be  defined  as  a  series  of  reconstructed  guesses,  intelli- 
gent in  using  what  is  offered  in  aid,  and  overcoming 
so  far  as  may  be  the  insuperable  obstacles  that  con- 
front all  such  efforts  to  solve  the  unattainable :  a  true 
portrait  of  a  human  being  by  the  hand  of  another. 
Strictly  speaking,  it  has  never  been  achieved  and  never 
70 


Hs  <S>tbers  See  1H5 

will  be.  Not  only  do  you  not  know  a  person 
out  of  bygone  days,  and  never  can  know  him; 
you  do  not  know  a  contemporary.  Think  of  the 
gross  caricatures  of  any  leading  politician  to-day 
derived  through  press  and  partisan  picture!  What 
do  you  and  I  really  know  of  the  intentions  of  Kaiser 
Wilhelm,  or  the  secret  counsels  of  Mr.  Asquith,  or  of 
the  purpose  of  the  Progressive  Party  in  the  United 
States?  To  be  sure,  we  talk  glibly  about  these  things 
and  assume  a  virtue  if  we  have  it  not;  but  be  honest 
with  yourself  and  thoughtful  for  a  moment,  and  you 
will  readily  grant  that  your  ignorance  is  superb,  yours 
and  mine  and  everybody's. 

Then  take  an  excursion  into  old  times  and  ask  your- 
self- what  your  idea  of  a  character  like  Nero  is. 
Frankly,  does  he  seem  to  you  a  man  at  all  ?  Is  he  not 
rather  a  hideous,  inconceivable  monster,  playing  his 
fiddle  to  the  orchestral  accompaniment  of  the  flames 
of  Rome?  And  yet,  on  second  thought,  you  must 
confess  that  he  was  a  human  being,  neither  more  nor 
less,  to  be  explained  somehow  by  the  laws  of  human 
psychology.  Whereupon  you  begin  to  suspect  that  the 
accounts  of  him  do  not  give  the  correct  picture;  some- 
how or  other  he  is  out  of  drawing  in  the  stock  accounts, 
and  you  welcome  a  Stephen  Phillips  when  he  tries  to 
show  the  Roman  emperor  as  a  weak,  self-indulgent 
esthete,  gradually  undermining  his  character  until  he 
is  led  into  the  incredible  cruelties  for  which  he  is 
notorious. 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^literature  an&  SLife 

It  is  noticeable  that  the  trend  of  the  modern  his- 
torical reshaping  of  characters  in  the  past  is  as  a  rule 
in  the  direction  of  whitewashing  them,  when  their 
earlier  reputation  was  dark.  This  simply  means  that 
we  have  applied  a  better  knowledge  of  human  nature 
to  their  case  as  well  as  scanned  the  records  more  care- 
fully for  new  views  upon  the  complex  question  of 
what  any  human  being  really  is.  Recognizing  this 
complexity,  we  see  that  we  must  present  the  character 
with  more  of  variety  and  contradiction  than  before, 
when  it  was  shown  as  all  white  or  all  black, —  a  too 
easy  disposition  of  so  mixed  a  matter.  In  the  end, 
we  think  a  bit  better  of  Henry  VIII  or  Nero  perhaps, 
—  yes,  even  of  the  Devil  himself,  who,  according  to 
the  homely  saw,  may  not  be  as  black  as  he  is  painted. 
He  had  such  good  qualities  in  Milton's  epic  that  the 
great  Puritan  poet,  in  spite  of  himself,  made  him  his 
hero,  quite  the  most  enjoyable  personage  in  the  drama 
of  man's  fall. 

No,  we  know  not  the  men  and  women  of  the  past, 
nor  our  contemporaries,  nor  the  members  of  our  own 
families,  not  even  ourselves.  Every  man  is  a  mystery  to 
himself,  and  which  way  the  cat  will  jump  is  uncertain 
to  the  end.  The  Greeks  knew  whereof  they  spoke 
when  they  coined  those  terrible  words:  "Know 
thyself."  They  saw  that  life  holds  nothing  more 
difficult,  and  worth  essaying.  For,  in  so  far  as  we 
know  ourselves,  we  may  know  others. 


Soul  Bebinfc 

IN  the  best  of  all  possible  worlds  the  face  should 
be  an  index  of  character.  And  it  is  likely  that 
the  general  opinion  of  the  present  world  would  lean 
that  way.  People  judge  character  by  countenance, 
and  believe  they  find  a  correspondence  between  the 
lines  limned  by  living  and  the  soul  that  behind  these 
surface  signs  really  represents  personality. 

Is  the  theory  true?  Oscar  Wilde,  in  his  remark- 
able, morbid  study,  "  The  Picture  of  Dorian  Gray," 
sharply  contrasts  human  beauty  and  brains.  "  Beauty, 
real  beauty,"  he  says,  "  ends  where  an  intellectual 
expression  begins.  Intellect  is  in  itself  a  mode  of  ex- 
aggeration, and  destroys  the  harmony  of  any  face. 
The  moment  one  sits  down  to  think,  one  becomes  all 
nose,  or  all  forehead,  or  something  horrid.  Look  at 
the  successful  men  in  any  of  the  learned  professions. 
How  perfectly  hideous  they  are.  Except,  of  course, 
in  the  church.  But  then,  in  the  church  they  don't 
think.  A  bishop  keeps  on  saying  at  the  age  of  eighty 
what  he  was  told  to  say  when  he  was  a  boy  of  eighteen, 
and  as  a  natural  consequence  he  always  looks  absolutely 
delightful." 

The  epigrammatic  cynicism  is  typical  of  the  author 
73 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^literature  anfc  Xife 


and,  of  course,  need  not  be  taken  too  seriously.  But  the 
question  it  begets  is  piquant  and  arresting.  It  is  likely 
that  most  thoughtful  people  have  occasionally  won- 
dered, when  they  have  been  confronted  by  some  rascal 
with  an  angel  face,  or  looked  upon  the  ugly  physi- 
ognomy of  a  saint,  whether,  after  all,  the  popular  idea 
that  the  outward  semblance  is  an  index  of  the  inner 
state  is  not  misleading. 

The  question  is  greatly  complicated  by  the  obvious 
fact  that  we  all  read  into  a  face  the  attributes  we  have 
learned,  from  contact  with  a  person,  he  really  possesses. 
Therefore,  all  goodness  imputed  to  a  countenance  from 
such  knowledge  is  of  dubious  value,  to  say  the  least. 
We  do  not  expect  a  bank-president  to  look  like  a  yokel, 
nor  the  leader  of  a  great  humanitarian  movement  like 
a  cutthroat.  Those  faces  have  got  to  bear  some  sym- 
bolic resemblance,  we  feel,  to  the  activities  of  their 
owners  ;  hence,  we  see  in  them  the  qualities  that  should 
be  there.  The  true  test,  and  the  only  one  of  scientific 
value,  would  be  to  take  a  dozen  human  beings  so 
garbed  as  to  throw  no  light  upon  their  occupations, 
half  of  them  worthless  and  criminal,  the  other  half 
the  salt  of  the  earth,  and,  mixing  them  together  and 
standing  them  up  in  a  row,  let  a  jury,  no  one  of  whom 
ever  set  eyes  on  them  before,  pronounce  upon  their 
characters  and  kinds  of  work.  It  would  be  a  vastly 
interesting  experiment,  and  some  of  us  feel  by  no  means 
cocksure  that  the  result  would  not  establish  and  con- 
firm the  theory  of  "  misfit  faces,"  to  use  an  expression 

74 


Soul  ffiebfnfc 

adopted  by  an  anonymous  writer  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly  some  years  ago.  I,  for  one,  very  much  doubt 
my  ability  to  separate  the  sheep  from  the  goats  under 
such  conditions  of  test. 

It  is  with  this  feeling  in  mind  as  to  the  lack  of  cor- 
respondence between  character  and  countenance  that 
Rostand  has  drawn  his  Cyrano.  The  poor  fellow,  with 
his  obesity  and  his  monstrous  nose,  is  anything  but  a 
lyric  figure;  yet  he  has  the  brains  and  the  poetry  so 
that  he  can  hide  in  the  shadow  and  woo  Roxane  for 
the  handsome  Christian,  who  is  a  tailor's  model  for 
intellect.  Christian  furnishes  the  body  and  Cyrano 
the  soul  for  that  joint- wooing.  And  at  last  Roxane 
appreciates,  though  too  late,  the  nobility  and  beauty 
that  hide  behind  a  homely  exterior.  The  masterpieces 
of  literature  have  not  seldom  embodied  this  pathetic 
contrast,  man's  sense  of  his  unideal  presentment,  so 
incongruous  with  his  best  thought  and  feeling. 

Perhaps  the  insistence  on  the  correspondence  be- 
tween body  and  brain,  character  and  countenance,  is 
based  upon  the  human  hunger  for  unity,  for  the  se- 
quence of  cause  and  effect.  Good  action  ought  to 
translate  itself  into  the  lineaments :  a  soulful  eye,  mean- 
ing soul;  a  delicate  peach-bloom  complexion,  a  like 
delicacy  of  nature ;  and  a  firm  mouth,  an  inflexible  will. 
It  may  be  conceded  that  the  great  majority  believe  in 
these  correspondences.  And  it  is  certain  that  practi- 
cally all  the  world  acts  upon  this  assumption.  What- 
ever our  philosophic  theory,  when  it  comes  to  everyday 

75 


Xittle  lEssass  in  Xtterature  an&  Xtfe 


action  we  get  a  quick  impression  from  a  face,  and 
make  up  our  minds  about  the  personality  behind  it  ;  we 
have  to  have  some  such  short-cut  to  a  decision,  and  this 
is  the  natural  one.  And  if  we  have  some  understand- 
ing of  the  conditions  in  our  complex  lives  which  mold 
the  features,  we  cannot,  in  ordinary  cases,  go  far 
wrong  in  our  judgments. 

Then,  often,  the  first  instinctive  opinion  may  be 
modified  by  later  experience,  as  we  become  what  is 
called  "  acquainted  "  with  the  person  on  trial.  No 
type  is  more  familiar  than  the  "  intuitive  "  man,  who 
goes  by  his  impressions  in  this  way  and  tells  you  that 
he  has  never  been  fooled,  that  his  offhand  estimate, 
made  instantly  and  never  changed,  is  perfectly  trust- 
worthy. Many  a  business  man  has  taken  this  kind  of 
judgment  from  his  wife,  as  likely  as  not  against  his 
own  feeling,  and  found  that  she  was  right  ;  women  are 
credited,  with  considerable  show  of  reason,  with  spe- 
cial powers  in  this  intuitive  sizing  up  of  character 
from  appearance. 

Yet  it  cannot  be  denied  by  one  who  chews  the  cud 
of  life  ruminatingly,  and  hesitates  to  arrange  his  be- 
liefs in  changeless  categories,  that  there  is  much  in  this 
contradictory  and  well-nigh  baffling  universe  to  give 
him  pause  when  he  tries  to  set  up  a  regular  causal  con- 
nection between  the  soul  that  molds  the  face  and  the 
face  that  mirrors  the  soul.  At  times,  he  has  the  feel- 
ing that  there  ought  to  be  such  correspondence,  and 
would  be  if  all  were  ordered  aright;  but  he  is  not  so 


Soul  IBebinfc 

sure  about  it.  His  state  of  mind  is  admirably  ex- 
pressed in  the  words  of  Sam  Lawton  in  Mrs.  Stowe's 
"  Oldtown  Folks,"  a  book  which  we  fear  the  younger 
generation  has  hardly  heard  of.  Lawton  is  venting 
his  mental  uncertainty  as  to  life's  riddle:  "Wai, 
sometimes  I  think  it  is,  and  then  again,  I  dunno." 

At  bottom,  I  suspect  that  the  attempt  to  make  the 
face  a  title-page  of  what  lies  beneath  and  follows  after 
is  but  a  part  of  man's  general  attempt  to  make  an 
essentially  mysterious  world  a  bit  less  mysterious  by 
reading  it  in  terms  of  logic  and  causal  connection. 
Art  of  all  sorts  is  continually  striving  to  do  this  by 
offering  explanations  where  life  does  not,  by  showing 
the  whole  where  life  gives  but  a  partial  peep,  by  in- 
troducing regularity  and  beauty  into  what  seems  mostly 
tangle  and  distortion.  Nor  is  this  a  pessimistic  con- 
clusion. It  may  be  in  the  scheme  of  things  that  the 
soul  should  be  detected  in  spite  of  "  this  muddy  vesture 
of  decay,"  as  the  old  poet  calls  the  body,  not  because 
of  it;  and  the  frequent  association  of  a  plain  face  with 
all  the  Christian  virtues  may  be  a  method  of  suggesting 
to  us  wordlings  that  we  must  look  away  from  the  flesh 
to  the  spirit,  and  remember  that  the  one  is  but  the 
transient  companion  of  the  other. 


77 


Iron?  of  Success 

THE  irony  of  success  lies  in  its  looking  so  suc- 
cessful. The  irony,  indeed,  is  dual:  the  phi- 
losopher smiles  a  slow,  wise  smile,  when  he  sees  how 
others  receive  the  success,  and  how  the  recipient  him- 
self takes  it.  It  is  in  such  spectacles  that  the  gods 
must  find  their  amusement,  if  they  be  dowered  with  a 
sense  of  humor. 

Success,  in  the  traditional,  worldly  sense,  means  the 
attainment  of  those  desirables:  position,  place,  and  pelf. 
The  man  who  becomes  prominent  in  a  decent  way  — 
to  say  nothing  of  him  who  becomes  notorious,  and 
there  are  circles  where  that  is  success  —  is  a  success- 
ful man;  so  is  he  who  rolls  up  money;  or  he  who  sets 
before  himself  not  so  much  prominence  as  power,  be- 
hind which  he  perhaps  masks,  yet  gloats  on  the  feeling 
it  brings, —  a  sense  of  controlling  men  or  events  or  the 
physical  laws  of  the  universe.  To  set  up  an  aim,  what- 
ever it  may  be,  and  then  to  gain  it;  this  is  commonly 
reckoned  as  success  among  men. 

For  the  good  of  the  soul,  it  is  salutary  to  look  things 
square  in  the  face,  if  only  once  a  year,  and  no  time  is 
better  than  the  new  year,  with  all  its  chances  and 
changes,  its  certain  tests  and  trials,  its  joys  and  sor- 

78 


Ube  Urons  ot  Success 

rows,  the  infinite  opportunities  it  offers  for  redress, 
repentance,  reform,  growth,  and  the  exercise  of  the 
higher  activities  of  one's  nature.  The  irrefutable  fact 
is  that,  in  the  estimation  of  life  which  sees  it  in  its 
true  proportions,  success  is  none  of  these  gauds  and 
baubles  of  living.  Success  is  spiritual,  and  nothing 
else.  You  succeed  in  the  great  art  of  life  just  accord- 
ing as  you  have  formed  character,  advanced  in  the 
exercise  of  truth,  purity,  and  kindness. 

Failure,  contrariwise,  whatever  be  the  conspicuity  of 
your  post  or  the  resounding  nature  of  your  accomplish- 
ment before  men,  is  to  end  life  without  having,  on  the 
whole,  evolved  out  of  those  lower  conditions  into  some- 
thing loftier  and  lovelier.  Does  this  seem  a  hard  say- 
ing? If  so,  O  friend,  it  is  because  you  have  fallen 
into  an  easy  acceptance  of  the  notion  that  there  is  a 
difference  between  preaching  and  practising;  that  we 
may  declare  of  a  Sunday  that  the  really  important  mat- 
ter is  spiritual  progress,  for  ourselves  and  for  the  world, 
without  practically  meaning  it  at  all.  But  such  self- 
deception  is  insidiously  undermining.  Face  the  facts, 
and  see  without  a  blench  or  a  denial  that,  unless  it  be 
said  that  this  world  is  not  based  four-square  on  moral 
foundations,  we  cannot  escape  the  conclusion  that  life's 
only  meaning,  to  the  thoughtful  eye,  lies  in  its  being 
a  spiritual  battleground  upon  which  we  are  all  en- 
gaged in  daily  conflict,  always  winning  or  losing,  gain- 
ing in  strength  or  growing  weak  from  our  wounds, 
and,  as  from  the  shaping  of  swords,  acquiring  character. 

79 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 

If  one  thinks  at  all  below  the  surface  of  life,  one  sim- 
ply cannot  get  away  from  this  truth. 

This  is  the  reason  that  the  great  so-called  tragic  pic- 
tures of  life  in  literature  do  not  place  the  emphasis 
upon  the  mere  matter  of  death ;  why  should  they,  since 
we  all  must  die,  and  if  that  is  tragic  there  is  nothing 
but  tragedy  in  human  fate  ?  The  tragedy  in  "  Mac- 
beth "  does  not  inhere  in  the  deaths  of  the  king  and 
his  liege  lady,  but  in  the  awful  spiritual  disaster  that 
befalls  them  through  the  power  of  a  worldty  temptation 
to  seize  place  and  power.  And  in  the  same  way,  the 
tragedy  of  King  Lear  lies  not  in  his  passing,  but  in  the 
pitiable  weakness  and  shortsightedness  which  led  him 
to  mistake  the  blunt  honesty  of  the  faithful  Cordelia 
and  so  turn  to  her  faithless  sisters  for  comfort  and 
protection.  If  Lear  were  not  to  blame  at  all  for  his 
end,  then  he  would  be  but  a  meaningless  puppet  in 
the  hands  of  an  inscrutable  fate. 

The  original  title  of  Frances  Squire's  strong  novel, 
"  The  Ballingtons,"  was  "  The  Survival  of  Ferdinand 
Ballington";  the  publishers,  for  practical  purposes  of 
advertisement,  shortened  the  thing  and  thereby  ob- 
scured its  fine  satiric  purport.  For,  in  surviving, 
Ballington  exhibits  to  the  reader  a  splendid  example 
of  complete  spiritual  failure,  yet  prosperous  in  the 
worldly  sense;  while  his  beautiful  wife,  dying,  is  the 
book's  outstanding  illustration  of  true  success,  albeit 
the  fleshpots  are  not  for  her.  Ballington,  in  other 
words,  survives  in  the  biological  sense  alone. 

80 


1frons  of  Success 

The  shining  spiritual  successes  of  history  have  been 
prevailingly  poor  and  humble  persons:  John  the  Bap- 
tist, Christ,  Socrates,  Epictetus,  a  Kempis,  and  a  sweet 
host  more.  The  world's  records  show  no  more  un- 
successful person,  judged  by  worldly  tests,  than  was  the 
founder  of  the  Christian  religion,  viewed  at  the  time 
of  his  early  death. 

"  But,"  says  he  of  practical  bent,  always  and  ever 
demanding  some  reward  for  work,  "  some  equivalent 
in  the  world  or  from  God,  for  the  long  struggle  and 
the  hard- won  victory,  shows  us  that  it  pays.  If  we 
set  out  to  make  money,  and  get  it,  we  can  at  least  lie 
back  and  hear  it  chink,  we  can  purchase  with  it  many 
things  desired  and  desirable,  we  can  make  our  families 
comfortable,  even  after  our  death;  and,  before  and 
after  that  event,  can  do  much  in  a  public  way  to  help 
suffering  humanity,  not  to  mention  no  end  of  innocent 
gratification  in  the  way  of  art  and  literature  and  travel. 
What  is  your  balancing  compensation  ?  " 

It  might  be  a  sufficient  reply  to  say  that,  quite  aside 
from  whether  one  likes  it  or  not,  entirely  apart  from 
rewards,  the  world  happens  to  be  founded  on  spiritual 
facts,  and  unless  the  individual  has  succeeded  in  the 
well-nigh  impossible  task  of  killing  his  higher  nature, 
he  knows  it,  however  much  he  may  bluster  and  dodge 
the  stern,  inevitable  issue. 

Recompense  there  is,  nevertheless.  Whatever  be  the 
station  attained,  the  material  success  piled  up,  the  im- 
portance realized,  without  that  validation  of  conscience, 

81 


Xtttle  Bssass  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 


"  uneasy  lies  the  head  that  wears  a  crown."  Have  you 
observed  a  more  enviable  expression  of  happiness  upon 
the  faces  of  those  called  successful?  I  wot  not.  The 
face,  which  we  agree  to  call  the  index  of  the  spirit,  re- 
ports some  dreadful  secrets  concerning  some  in  high 
places,  and  those  faces  rise  before  you  as  you  read  these 
words.  Why  do  captains  of  industry  turn  in  their  later 
years  to  an  almost  rabid  practice  of  philanthropy?  It 
might  be  unfair  to  say,  to  quiet  a  guilty  conscience  ;  yet 
it  is  perhaps  not  entirely  because  in  their  maturity  they 
see  more  clearly  that  service  is  better  than  grab. 

Upon  the  faces  of  the  spiritually  successful  one  ob- 
serves the  peace  that  passeth  all  understanding;  and 
knows  that  it  is  but  an  index  of  a  state  within.  Neither 
temporal  change,  time,  disaster,  nor  death  can  take  this 
away.  Riches  can  be  removed  in  a  night  and  must  be 
left  to  others  in  the  end;  naked  we  came  and  naked 
we  shall  depart.  But  a  character  that  is  the  result  of 
the  consistent  struggle  of  a  lifetime,  —  that  is  a  per- 
manent possession.  Nothing  can  take  it  away,  and, 
though  we  live  a  thousand  lives,  it  can  but  increase 
with  the  cycles  and  be  a  moving  force  through  all 
worlds. 


82 


fteep  on  Working 

HEALTH,  work,  and  religion  are  the  three  things 
which  make  life  least  a  bore  and  most  a  blessing. 
Nor  need  work  apologize  to  the  other  two.  Work 
of  the  right  kind  conduces  to  health  and  becomes  re- 
ligion; hence  the  Scriptural  commendation  of  good 
workmen  by  Solomon :  "  They  shall  maintain  the 
fabric  of  the  world,  and  in  the  handiwork  of  their 
craft  is  their  prayer." 

It  was  Burke,  I  believe,  who  with  this  in  mind 
offered  the  advice :  "  Work,  work,  and  never  despair ; 
but  even  if  you  do  despair,  keep  on  working."  He 
knew  it  for  a  chief  antidote  against  hopelessness. 

Ruskin  once  said  that  there  were  three  desiderata 
for  a  happy  life:  congenial  work,  not  too  much  of  it, 
and  a  fair  return  for  one's  labor.  As  to  this  last,  he 
did  not  mean  a  mere  reward  in  money,  but  a  sense  in 
the  worker  that  his  product  is  of  use,  of  value  to 
fellow-men,  that  he  has  not  in  this  sense  labored  in 
vain.  The  return  may  come  in  the  respect  of  the  com- 
munity, its  readiness  to  intrust  him  with  some  under- 
taking of  importance  to  the  general  weal, —  in  this, 
rather  than  in  the  sum  he  is  paid.  The  big  thing  is  the 
consciousness  in  the  worker  that  he  is  a  help,  not  a 


Xittle  Essays  fn  ^literature  anfc  3Lifc 

hindrance,  to  the  social  machine;  that  he  makes  some- 
thing that  has  beauty  or  utility  or,  better  yet,  both. 

The  number  of  those  who  work  in  a  way  to  illustrate 
Ruskin's  ideal  makes  but  a  small  fraction  of  the  great 
army  of  workers.  Consider  the  misfits,  for  one  thing. 
It  is  astonishing  how  many  folk  will  say  to  you,  "My 
business  is  merely  a  manner  of  money-getting.  It  is 
distasteful  to  me  in  the  extreme  and  I  would  get  out 
of  it  to-morrow  if  I  could.  My  pleasure  comes  from 
the  hours  outside  my  work."  What  a  pity  this  is,  for 
if  a  human  being  has  any  right,  it  is  the  right  of  congen- 
ial employment,  the  chance  to  do  what  he  is  interested 
in,  that  which  stimulates  his  faculties  and  draws  out 
his  best  endeavor.  It  is  only  by  doing  such  work  that 
he  becomes  of  full  value  to  society.  But  for  various 
reasons  mortals  go  into  work  for  other  than  the  im- 
perative reason  of  calling:  because  the  business  was 
handed  down  from  father  to  son;  because  a  stern  ne- 
cessity of  self-support  demanded  that  the  first  work 
that  came  to  hand  should  be  done;  or,  again,  because 
the  rewards  were  so  glittering  that  repugnance  was 
overcome.  And  yet,  surely,  all  men  and  women  should 
be  doing  the  manner  of  work  most  to  their  liking,  most 
expressive  of  their  personality;  the  one  thing  they  were 
born  to  do,  and  therefore  can  do  happily  and  do  best. 

Parents  have  a  terrible  responsibility  here,  and  too 
often  misconceive  it,  when  they  compel  their  young 
ones  to  take  up  some  form  of  activity  not  suited  to 
their  powers.  It  would  be  well  to  understand  that, 


Ifceep  on 

whenever  serious-minded,  well-meaning  young  persons 
have  a  deep  conviction  that  a  certain  sort  of  work  calls 
them,  they  should  be  allowed  to  give  it  a  trial.  By  do- 
ing so,  either  they  find  that  it  is  their  true  occupation,  or 
not,  and  so,  satisfied,  turn  to  other  work.  But  if  they 
do  not  give  it  a  trial,  they  will  be  dissatisfied  to  their 
death-day.  The  beginning  and  basis  of  the  right  kind 
of  a  life,  then,  is  choosing  wisely  one's  work.  The 
world  has  no  use  for  misfits,  and  the  misfits  are  un- 
happy, poor  creatures,  when  half  the  time  it  is  not  al- 
together their  fault,  but  the  fault  of  their  environment 
or  necessity. 

Think,  also,  of  the  immense  number  of  human  be- 
ings who  work  under  the  wrong  conditions:  hours 
overlong,  work-places  lacking  air  and  light,  needless 
harshness,  even  cruelty,  of  employers,  the  nature  of  the 
toil  brutalizing  and  demoralizing.  The  figures  would 
sadden,  and  the  facts  appal,  could  they  be  comprehended 
to  their  full  extent.  It  was  with  this  abuse  of  work, 
as  it  touched  the  children,  in  mind  that  great-hearted 
Mrs.  Browning,  half  a  century  ago,  wrote  that  piercing 
"  Cry  of  the  Children,"  which,  in  its  white-hot  passion 
of  loving  sorrow,  was  one  of  the  documents  of  the  day, 
and  led  on  to  our  own,  when  industrial  conditions  are 
being  bettered. 

Do  you  hear  the  children  weeping  and  disproving, 
O  my  brothers,  what  ye  preach? 
For  God's  possible  is  taught  by  His  world's  loving, 
And  the  children  doubt  of  each. 

85 


Xtttle  JEssags  tn  Xiterature  a^  Xite 

Even  when  the  physical  conditions  that  surround  the 
work  are  endurable  or  pleasant,  that  work  is  not  what 
it  should  be  that  lacks  a  sense  of  aim  and  accomplish- 
ment. It  is  better  to  make  something  one  can  take  a 
pleasure  in  the  making  of ;  but  how  seldom  is  that  true 
of  the  worker !  Grant,  with  the  old  poet,  that  to  sweep 
a  room  in  the  right  spirit  "  makes  that  and  the  action 
fine " ;  still,  to  be  honest,  there  is  work  and  work, 
and  it  is  hard  to  see  how  the  labor  of  a  man  in  the 
stockyards,  in  whatever  spirit  done,  can  give  that  in- 
ward satisfaction  which  ought  to  come  from  every  kind 
of  human  labor,  no  matter  how  fruitless  or  lowly. 

A  special  danger  has  arisen  from  the  modern  differ- 
entiation of  work,  for  the  reason  that,  where  once  the 
head,  hand,  and  heart  collaborated  in  a  trinity  of  ac- 
tivity to  the  making  of  a  seemly  whole,  now,  with  the 
advent  of  machinery,  the  labor  has  largely  become 
partial,  blind,  and  so  pleasureless.  To  make  a  pin  may 
not  be  esthetic  work,  but  it  is  much  better  than  to 
make  the  head  of  a  pin,  because  in  the  former  case  you 
are  at  least  intelligently  producing  something  of  whole- 
ness and  usefulness.  Manhood  and  womanhood  should 
be  retained  in  the  work,  but  to  make  the  head  of  a  pin 
has  the  tendency  to  make  a  machine  out  of  a  human 
being:  it  is  not  a  finished  product,  but  merely  part  of 
the  process  of  its  making. 

It  is  a  satire  to  talk  about  pleasure  in  one's  work 
under  some  conditions.  The  present-day  handicraft 
movement  is  a  reaction  to  the  better  conditions  of  work 

86 


fseep  on 

in  an  age  past  when  the  artisan,  the  workman,  was  also 
the  artist,  having  joy  of  his  labor,  and  so  preserving 
his  humanity.  Doubtless,  we  shall  gradually  so  alter 
the  social  wrongs  and  evils,  which  now  make  this 
planet  appear  a  little  damaged,  and  install  the  worker 
in  work  so  congenial,  so  close-fitted  to  his  aptitude  and 
desire,  that  it  will  be  his  deepest  satisfaction  and  most 
lasting  solace ;  that  which  steadies,  rectifies,  uplifts,  and 
rejoices  him  throughout  his  days  and  up  to  the  final 
rest.  Nay,  are  we  not  altering  our  conceptions  of 
Heaven  in  order  to  allow  of  happy,  useful,  unselfish 
work  there, —  work,  instead  of  the  older  notion  of  sit- 
ting around  in  an  elegant  leisure  enlivened  by  select 
music  ? 

Work,  ideally,  should  be  congenial,  fruitful,  and  the 
worker  aware  of  his  worth  to  the  world.  Nobody 
works  harder  than  the  idler;  he  has  on  his  hands  the 
dire  task  of  killing  time.  Knowing  the  awfulness  of 
vacuity,  he  fills  the  day  with  a  semblance  of  activity, 
while  gnawing  at  his  peace  is  a  sense  of  the  barren 
folly  of  it  all.  The  finest  argument  for  real  work  is 
the  spectacle  of  its  counterfeit  presentment. 


Ibere&it?  anb  Character 

I  ONCE  saw  a  turtle  tethered  to  a  piece  of  string, 
the  other  end  of  which  was  fastened  to  a  large 
basin  of  muddy  water,  in  which  he  might  disport  him- 
self when  wearied  of  land  explorations.  The  string 
was  long  enough  to  allow  him  to  walk  lumberingly 
for  quite  a  distance  in  a  line  which  described  a  radius 
from  the  pail  as  a  center.  When  he  had  reached  the 
limit  of  the  circle  and  the  tightening  of  the  bond  told 
him  that  such  was  the  case,  the  torpid  animal,  with 
projected,  yearning  head  and  big  staring  eyes,  still 
moving  onward,  as  he  thought,  crept  in  a  slow  cir- 
cumference round  the  central  basin,  drawn  by  the 
urgency  of  the  confining  cord. 

"  Poor  beast,"  mused  I,  "  does  he  not  typify  man, 
striving  toward  some  desired  end  or  aim,  his  path  un- 
consciously determined  and  made  a  mere  recurrent  cir- 
cling-round,  by  the  inevitable  secret  forces  of  environ- 
ment and  heredity  ?  " 

In  truth,  modern  thought,  especially  in  its  scientific 
aspects,  has  tended  to  emphasize  the  tyrannous  influ- 
ence of  the  ante-natal  powers  that  condition  character 
and  make  self-striving  seem  often  futile.  Environ- 
ment, too,  is  another  dominant  force  of  which  we  hear 


ant)  Cbaracter 

much, —  if  not  too  much.  If  we  choose  to  carry  out 
the  idea  to  its  logical  extreme,  all  will-power  becomes 
but  a  figment  of  the  brain  and  our  doctrine  that  of  the 
fatalist.  Man  is  then  an  automaton,  pushed  blindly 
on  to  his  doom,  given  the  appearance  of  freedom  in 
order  that  he  may  have  heart  enough  to  live  with  some 
courage  and  hope,  rather  than  —  accepting  the  fact 
that  he  is  foreordained  to  fail  —  take  his  life  and  so 
anticipate  his  fate.  Predestination  was  familiar  to  the 
world  in  the  Calvinistic  theology;  here,  in  later  time, 
it  receives  a  wider  and  even  sterner  application. 

Whatever  of  plausibility  there  may  be  in  this  latter- 
day  mode  of  thinking,  one  thing  is  sure:  the  main  work 
of  the  world  has  been  done  on  quite  another  assump- 
tion. Since  time  out  of  mind,  man  has  gone  cheer- 
fully ahead,  believing  that  he  had  the  right  and  ability 
to  choose,  confident  that  he  was  the  architect  of  his 
own  fortunes,  and  filled  with  emulation  because  of  the 
belief.  His  attitude,  and  the  conviction  behind  it,  are 
expressed  in  this  fine  passage  from  old  Longinus: 
"  Nature  never  designed  man  to  be  a  groveling  and 
ungenerous  animal  but  brought  him  into  life,  and 
placed  him  in  the  world,  as  in  a  crowded  theater,  not 
to  be  an  idle  spectator,  but  spurred  on  by  an  eager 
thirst  of  excelling,  ardently  to  contend  in  the  pursuit 
of  glory.  For  this  purpose  she  implanted  in  his  soul 
an  invincible  love  of  grandeur,  and  a  constant  emula- 
tion of  whatever  seems  to  approach  nearer  to  divinity 
than  himself." 

89 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 


This  has  the  true  ring,  for  it  tallies  with  experience, 
both  one's  own  and  that  of  man's  in  general.  One  may 
grant  the  importance  of  Taine's  categories  of  the  race, 
the  milieu  and  the  moment,  as  immensely  influential  in 
life,  but  at  the  same  time  hold  on  with  a  death  grip 
dictated  by  commonsense  and  necessity  alike,  to  the 
notion  that  we  are  architects  of  our  fortunes,  at  the 
last.  Philosophically  speaking,  the  old  debate  over 
freewill  and  fate  will  never  cease  to  split  mankind  into 
opposing  camps  of  theory;  but  practically,  man  will 
continue  to  act  as  if  in  his  right  to  choose  lay  the  hour 
of  victory.  Moreover,  it  is  rather  a  comfort  to  reflect 
that  the  latest  biological  hypotheses  incline  to  give  more 
efficacy  to  environment  and  education  and  personal  in- 
itiative than  was  conceded  a  generation  ago  when  Dar- 
win burst  upon  the  world  with  his  astounding  new 
theory  of  life.  For  a  while  heredity  seemed  all  in  all, 
and  this  world-effort  a  mere  scratching  of  the  surface, 
where  deep-lying  forces  were  at  work  to  set  at  naught 
such  eleventh-hour  troubling.  But  now  we  are  com- 
ing to  feel  that  a  very  young  child  with  a  bad  family 
history,  if  only  subjected  early  enough  to  the  best  kind 
of  influences  at  home  and  in  school,  may  entirely  over- 
come the  sinister  handicap  with  which  he  started,  — 
a  handicap  regarded  at  first  as  well-nigh  fatal. 

In  fact,  the  world  will  never  cease  to  believe  in 
character  as  more  than  an  accident  ;  the  very  definition 
of  the  word  suggests  overcoming  obstacles  and  shaping 
conduct  toward  ends.  The  right  sort  of  man  is  irri- 

90 


t>erefctt£  an&  Cbaracter 

tated  by  the  mere  thought  that  he  lives  in  that  kind  of 
universe  where  there  is  no  relation  between  self-con- 
scious striving  and  a  desired  result.  He  may  not  have 
thought  it  out,  but  he  instinctively  accepts  that  noble 
saying:  "  As  a  category  of  knowledge,  character  is  the 
most  ultimate  thing  in  the  universe."  If,  by  the  time 
middle  age  has  been  accomplished,  the  belief  in  one's 
power  of  controlling  events  and  shaping  actions  has 
dimmed,  it  is  not  because  life  has  disproved  our  faith, 
but  only  that  we  sadly  confess  that,  in  the  words  of 
Stevenson,  we  have  "  tried  a  little,  failed  much."  The 
theory  was  right,  but  our  strength  to  put  it  into  prac- 
tice, alas,  was  so  uncertain!  At  twenty  we  dream,  at 
forty  we  dine;  yes,  but  we  still  might  dream  nobler 
dreams  at  forty,  at  sixty,  at  eighty,  if  only  we  had 
fought  the  good  fight  steadily,  unflinchingly,  to  the 
last  ditch.  We  must  avoid  blaming  the  laws  of  the 
universe  for  our  own  inability  to  obey  them. 

When  this  fatalistic  view  gets  into  literature,  it  pro- 
duces a  good  deal  of  superficial,  surface  brilliancy  with 
a  sure  dry-rot  of  substance.  Life  is  not  a  going  con- 
cern, in  the  business  phrase,  with  such  a  theory  back 
of  it;  and  hence,  and  naturally,  its  reflection  in  letters 
is  a  sort  of  static  presentation,  instead  of  the  dynamics 
that  move  the  emotions  and  stimulate  the  brains  of 
readers.  Where,  before,  the  writers  were  likely  to 
talk  about  the  immortals,  now  they  are  more  likely  to 
talk  about  the  immorals;  the  change  is  not,  on  the 
whole,  enjoyable. 

91 


OLittie  Bssags  in  ^Literature  anfc  SLife 

The  modern  man  has  one  thing  hammered  into  him, 
from  the  time  he  goes  to  his  first  school  to  the  time 
he  lies  down  for  final  sleep:  that  this  world  is  a  reign 
of  law.  It  is  true,  of  course,  but  perhaps  we  have 
harped  upon  it  a  little  too  insistently  in  relation  to 
certain  higher  aspects  of  living.  Maybe  it  is  well  to 
remind  ourselves  that  a  law  is  only  a  stale  miracle; 
that  to  Adam  the  first  sunrise  must  have  been  a  sen- 
sation comparable  to  that  to-day  if  before  our  very  eyes 
the  heavens  opened  and  the  white  throne  of  God  were 
revealed  in  all  its  splendor. 

Long  after  the  particular  theories  which  make  our 
age  so  important  in  our  own  estimation,  it  will  still  be 
true  that  life,  the  great  spiritual  adventure,  beckons  to 
each  and  offers  its  chances  and  rewards;  and  that  even 
as  our  forefathers  could  choose  and  strive  and  succeed, 
so  can  we.  We  continue  to  guess  about  things,  and  the 
modern  guess  is  in  some  ways  shrewder;  but  man  is 
substantially  the  same  creature,  and  ancestry,  heredity, 
environment,  personality,  are  but  names  for  everlasting 
facts.  Courage  is  no  outworn  attitude,  and  faith,  as 
of  yore,  is  a  sign  of  good  health,  both  of  body  and  soul. 


92 


Xife  tbe 

A  FRENCHMAN  has  said  that  life  is  a  comedy 
for  those  who  think,  a  tragedy  for  those  who 
feel.  But  many  of  us  both  think  and  feel, 
and  for  all  such  life  is  either  tragi-comedy  or 
comi-tragedy ;  the  former  if,  despite  the  tragic  ele- 
ments, it  ends  well,  in  the  simple  phrase;  the  latter  if, 
with  all  the  unquestionable  alleviations,  it  ends  ill, — 
in  a  blind  alley  which  awaits  us  all.  And  this  de- 
pends a  good  deal  on  the  way  we  take  it.  To  Pippa, 
and  to  Browning  back  of  her,  "  God  's  in  his  heaven, 
all 's  right  with  the  world  " ;  whereas  to  the  melodious 
Preacher  all  is  vanity;  it  is  the  same  world  that  both 
face,  only  they  face  it  in  different  moods.  In  other 
words,  the  problem  is  hypothetical,  partly  because  the 
play  is  unfinished,  partly  because  it  is  colored  by  the 
personal  view  of  all  who  play  in  it, —  the  most  formi- 
dable list  extant  of  dramatis  persona:  to  wit,  the  chil- 
dren of  men. 

The  type  of  religionist  familiar  to  the  present  day 
and  generation  declares  that  the  life  beyond  the  grave 
explains  life  this  side  of  it,  and  reconciles  the  disasters 
of  earth.  "  And  God  shall  wipe  away  all  tears  from 
their  eyes,"  is  the  promise,  solemn,  beautiful,  deeply 

93 


Xittie  JEssass  in  Xtterature  an&  Xife 

comforting,  of  the  mystic  John.  And  so  hope  gilds 
the  gloom,  and  even  through  sorrow  shines  the  im- 
mortal word. 

But  for  those  who  conclude  that  death  ends  personal 
consciousness, —  and  there  are  now  many  such, —  life 
becomes  not  a  reasonable  plan  so  much  as  a  baffling 
mystery.  The  plan  is  explicable  so  far  as  this  world  is 
concerned;  such  persons  find  little  difficulty  in  adjust- 
ing themselves  to  the  laws  which  govern  human  action 
and  lead  to  success  in  the  conventional  meaning  of  the 
word ;  but  however  well  they  may  succeed  as  the  world 
judges,  back  of  all  earthly  shows  they  are  aware  of  the 
sphinx,  silent,  inscrutable,  eternal ;  for  them  at  least  the 
riddle  remains  unsolved. 

Some  in  this  position  take  refuge  in  pleasure,  sen- 
sual or  high  as  the  case  may  be.  Some,  with  a  sad 
stoicism,  decide  to  play  the  game  well,  whatever  it  may 
mean;  to  act  their  roles  as  they  should  be  done,  and 
when  the  curtain  rings  down,  to  say  good-night  in 
kindness  and  with  head  erect.  A  few,  although  believ- 
ing that  the  elder  faith  in  a  final  happy  goal  must  be 
abandoned,  profess  to  find  this  world  —  the  world  of 
work  and  love  and  honorable  joy  —  enough,  even  if  the 
night  cometh  when  no  man  may  work.  Bernard  Shaw 
is  one  such,  and  doubtless  he  has  his  followers  who 
will  cordially  respond  to  these  ringing  words: 

"  I  want  to  be  thoroughly  used  up  when  I  die,  for 
the  harder  I  work,  the  more  I  live.  I  rejoice  in  life 
for  its  own  sake.  Life  is  no  brief  candle  to  me.  It  is 

94 


%tfe  tbe 

a  sort  of  splendid  torch,  which  I  have  got  hold  of  for 
the  moment  and  I  want  to  make  it  burn  as  brightly  as 
possible  before  handing  it  on  to  future  generations." 

Still  others,  weaklings  as  we  call  them,  blow  out 
their  poor  brains  in  despair,  maddened  by  the  spectacle 
of  the  inevitable  cul-de-sac,  their  position  analogous  to 
the  Roman  who  fell  on  his  sword  when  honor  was  no 
more  or  fate  went  against  him  in  battle, —  save  that 
these  latter-day  deniers  of  life  no  longer  relish  it,  where 
the  Roman  simply  turned  his  back  upon  it  when,  for 
him,  it  was  over.  But  a  thing  to  note  in  this  see-saw 
of  conflicting  and  afflicting  guesses  at  the  insoluble  is 
that  each  and  all  must  perforce  adopt  some  philosophy. 
These  mighty  matters  cannot  be  demonstrated  as  we 
demonstrate  in  mathematics;  the  past,  with  its  neat, 
mechanical  theories  of  the  universe  unchallenged  by 
thoughtful  minds,  has  of  necessity  given  way  to  a 
larger  view,  whether  affirmative  or  negative.  Mean- 
while, a  reasonable  working  hypothesis  must  be  chosen, 
for  living  calls  for  action.  The  cock-sureness  of  our 
forefathers  is  replaced  by  some  such  understanding  and 
attitude. 

And  here  the  importance  of  the  purified  emotions 
must  be  realized,  carefully  separating  them  from  mere 
superstition,  and  that  atavistic  racial  instinct  which 
craves  life  and  therefore  postulates  it.  We  are  not 
foolish  to  trust  the  spiritual  perceptions,  since  they  are 
the  oldest  and  deepest  part  of  us,  and  in  confiding  in 
them  we  are  exercising  a  faith  which  lies  at  the  bottom 

95 


Xittie  Essays  in  Xiteratute  an&  Xtfe 

of  all  valid  human  action;  as  in  all  processes  of  reason 
we  assume  the  reality  and  reliability  of  our  thinking 
process,  an  attitude  expressed  in  Des  Cartes'  "  I  think, 
therefore  I  am."  It  is  no  shame  to  act  as  if  a  thing 
were  so  which  cannot  be  proved,  for  upon  such  con- 
fidence all  life  moves,  whether  in  practical  affairs  or 
the  sternest  method  of  logic.  Two  and  two  make 
four,  we  say;  why  so?  Simply  because  the  mind  thinks 
it;  on  Mars,  two  and  two  may  make  five.  What  is 
truth?  We  ask  with  Pontius  Pilate,  and  have  a  deeper 
sense  of  the  mystery  than  could  have  been  his.  It 
is  perhaps  a  relation  rather  than  a  fact,  the  relation  of 
the  human  mind  to  a  reality  forever  beyond  our  ken. 
The  philosophy  adopted  for  individual  use  will  be  a  web 
woven  of  wonderfully  complex  causal  threads;  an- 
cestry, epoch,  geography,  immediate  environment,  edu- 
cation, Will, —  all  that  personality  as  the  sum  total  of 
these  influences  implies,  and  something  more.  And 
it  is  of  great  import  to  every  human  soul  that  some 
theory  be  chosen  and  acted  upon,  for  the  play  is  on, 
and  while  we  may  pause  for  a  moment,  like  the  philos- 
opher, to  look  upon  the  scene  and  meditate,  primarily 
we  are  all  on  the  stage,  "  And  all  the  men  and  women 
merely  players,"  and  it  is  our  part  to  play  well,  gradu- 
ally learning  that  the  finest  art  means  to  be  true  to 
our  highest  thought,  that  only  thus  can  we  impress  upon 
the  auditors  that  action  is  the  solution  of  the  art  of 
living,  the  greatest  of  all  the  arts. 

So,  although  we  may,  in  turn,  sit  and  applaud  the 

96 


%ife  tbe 

piece,  or  criticize  it,  wondering  if  we  divine  its  end,  it  is 
but  wise  to  remember  that  our  place  is  upon  the  boards, 
we  must  get  us  back  to  the  stage,  throwing  ourselves 
with  all  heartiness  into  the  entrancing  drama  of  life; 
and  cherishing  the  hope,  which  may  become  belief  in 
time,  that  if  we  do  our  parts  well  the  Dramatist  will 
likewise  do  his,  and  the  final  act  (we  understand  no  play 
until  that  is  over)  send  actors  and  audience  to  their 
homes  in  happiness:  home,  where  there  are  light,  and 
good  cheer,  and  friendly,  beckoning  faces,  yes,  and  a 
deep  sense  of  well-being  after  the  fever  and  the  fret. 
Would  the  play  so  enthrall  us,  if  we  knew  its  issue, 
if  there  were  no  surprise  at  the  last  curtain?  And 
would  home  be  half  so  welcome  had  we  never  left  it 
for  the  struggle  and  strain  of  the  play  of  life?  Hark 
to  the  call  bell ;  up  rolls  the  curtain ;  the  drama  is  un- 
der way.  Linger  not  in  the  wings  with  beating  hearts, 
to  speculate  and  question ;  the  murmur  of  life  comes  to 
you  across  the  footlights;  go  out,  act,  grow,  and  so 
earn  the  coveted  prize,  and  the  reward  of  rest. 


97 


Hn  Epigram's  IDaiue 

A  CERTAIN  man  once  wrote  in  his  notebook: 
"  At  twenty  we  dream ;  at  forty  we  dine." 
Long  years  afterwards,  he  ran  across  it,  and  smiled 
musingly.  It  seemed  so  young,  so  all-knowing;  there 
was  something  fine  and  French  about  it.  When  it  was 
written  the  writer  firmly  believed  it  to  be  quite  original, 
a  contribution  by  him  to  the  pensees  of  the  world. 
Afterward  he  thought  of  Talleyrand  and  La  Roche- 
foucauld, and  wondered  if  it  were  not  purely  deriva- 
tive. 

Well  past  forty  himself,  he  found  that  while,  un- 
questionably, he  was  still  dining,  he  had  by  no  means 
stopped  dreaming.  The  diminution  of  dreams  with 
middle  age, —  that  is  to  say,  the  dimming  of  the  ideal, 
and  the  waning  use  of  the  imagination,  which,  with  the 
easy  omniscience  of  youth  he  had  assumed, —  had  not 
come  to  pass,  he  discovered.  Indeed,  his  imagination 
was  more  fully  awakened  to  the  beauty  of  the  world 
and  the  wonder  of  himself  and  of  his  fellow-man.  His 
sense  of  poetry  was  keener,  and  his  delight  in  the  best, 
based  on  a  wider  experience  and  a  more  vivid  sense  of 
life's  dramatic  contrasts,  had  grown  with  what  it  had 
fed  on.  If  his  desires  had  become  soberer,  his  vision 
tinged  with  a  consciousness  that  the  earth  is  a  stern 

98 


Bn  Epigram's  IDalue 

battleground,  all  the  better  had  he  learned  to  get  joy 
from  the  lyric  interludes  of  peace  and  the  throbbing 
raptures  of  victory.  Yes,  challenged  by  the  years,  his 
poor,  cheap  little  bit  of  pseudo-philosophy  did  not 
ring  true,  and  was  seen  for  what  it  was, —  a  surface 
guess  at  life,  neat  enough  in  expression  but  with  no 
universal  note  in  it  at  all. 

This  is  the  defect  in  all  such  utterances.  They  have 
a  value  of  form  perhaps,  or  a  taking  smartness  which 
fools  the  reader  or  hearer,  who  imagines  he  is  in  the 
presence  of  a  profound  generalization;  whereas,  what 
he  receives  is  merely  the  blase  mood  of  the  moment, 
together  with  a  certain  pride  in  phrasing.  Heine,  for 
example,  says  something  in  his  inimitable  way,  and  the 
magic  of  it  may  hide  the  fact  that,  poor  fellow  on  his 
mattress  grave,  he  is  but  giving  vent  to  the  personal 
anguish  of  the  instant :  to  write  is  his  nepenthe.  Oscar 
Wilde  took  a  perverse  pleasure  in  saying,,  with  a 
Greek-like  perfection  of  phrase  and  form,  exactly  the 
opposite  thing  from  what  the  thought  might  lead  us 
to  expect.  It  was  a  rather  shallow  trick  in  the  main, 
and  sadly  overworked  by  the  brilliant  apostle  of 
estheticism,  but  it  led  many  to  regard  him  as  little 
less  than  a  demigod.  How  different  in  tone  and  feel- 
ing and  penetration  is  the  Hebrew  pessimism  of 
Ecclesiastes  and  Job!  There  you  hear  the  ground- 
swell  of  the  human  soul,  confronted  by  the  great  in- 
explicable contradictions  of  life.  You  respect  the  soul 
travail  that  lies  under  it,  and  are  made  larger  as 

99 


Xittie  Bssags  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 

you  listen.  Even  the  melodious  despair  of  Omar 
Khayyam  is  a  different  thing  from  the  linguistic  rapier- 
thrusts  of  the  epigrammatist,  because  the  Persian  poet 
is  so  sad,  so  deeply  moved  in  his  emotions. 

It  would  be  as  well,  one  surmises,  if  all  authors  with 
the  epigrammatic  gift  were  not  allowed  to  frame  their 
thought  until  they  had  attained  to  years  of  discretion. 
Then  their  sallies  would  be  more  likely  to  be  sound  in 
substance  as  well  as  felicitous  in  form.  We  do  not 
object  to  the  satire  and  cynicism  of  a  Thackeray,  be- 
cause it  is  tempered  with  a  genial  knowledge  of  the 
world.  We  feel  that,  at  forty,  he  knows  whereof  he 
speaks  and  is  not  venting  personal  spleen,  but  looking 
at  the  polite  society  of  his  day  from  behind  those 
analytic  spectacles,  and  distinguishing  its  weaknesses. 
Becky  Sharp  is  true,  if  vicious;  she  is  all  but  lovable, 
so  human  is  she,  and  her  creator  is  fond  of  her,  else 
why  did  he  give  her  so  happy  an  end?  But  with 
Flaubert's  Madame  Bovary,  on  the  contrary,  you  are 
repelled  by  the  bitterness  of  the  picture. 

An  exception  might  be  made  in  favor  of  the  young 
poets  and  essayists  whose  power  of  crystallizing  human 
experience  in  a  bon  mot,  a  memorable  line  or  a  haunt- 
ing phrase,  seems  divination  more  than  knowledge  of 
the  world.  It  is  the  beautiful  folly  of  youth  to  dream 
a  star,  some  one  has  finely  said;  and  in  such  a  mood 
you  get  the  epigram  without  a  sting,  the  wit  that 
stimulates  but  does  not  bite,  and  the  laughter  that 
has  in  it  no  hard,  metallic  sound. 
100 


Hn  Epigram's  tflaiue 

Even  when  an  epigram  flashes  light  into  some  dark 
corner  of  personality,  it  is  more  often  than  not  only  a 
half-truth,  needing  the  corrective  touch  of  time  which 
enables  the  thinker  to  walk  all  round  his  subject  and 
see  it  from  many  sides.  It  is  rare  that,  with  polish  and 
concision  for  an  aim,  there  is  not  a  sacrifice  of  the 
symmetry  of  complete  truth.  It  is  a  danger  that  for- 
ever lurks  in  this  kind  of  verbal  gymnastics.  "  The 
more  I  see  of  men,  the  better  I  like  dogs,"  said  Ma- 
dame de  Stae'l.  Taken  simply  as  a  mode  of  ex- 
pressing a  love  for  the  canine,  this  is  admirable,  and 
delights  all  dog-lovers, —  and  their  name  is  legion. 
But  if  we  are  to  accept  it  as  a  general  opinion  on  men, 
it  is  extremely  misleading  and  unfair  to  a  sex  which, 
even  in  these  days  of  subjugation,  can  give  a  better  ac- 
count of  itself  than  the  great  Frenchwoman  would 
have  us  believe.  Yet,  unless  the  French  woman-wit 
had  put  it  that  way,  we  should  not  have  remembered 
it,  nor  had  so  distinct  an  impression  of  her  attitude 
toward  a  certain  species  of  animal. 

In  youth,  we  play  with  words  and  prefer  cleverness 
to  accuracy.  In  maturity,  we  are  more  inclined  to 
weigh  our  sentences  and  measure  their  influence  upon 
others. 

It  is  perhaps  fair  to  say  that  the  pleasure  to  be  de- 
rived from  any  epigram  is  too  expensive,  if  the  price  we 
pay  for  it  be  the  loss  of  faith  and  the  blight  of  dis- 
illusionment. 

Again  and  again,  a  false  antithesis  is  set  up  by  these 
IOI 


Olittte  Essays  in  Xtterature  anfc  Xife 

pinchbeck  substitutes  for  gold,  as  in  the  sentence  with 
which  we  began.  Why  must  one  either  dream  or  dine  ? 
Are  the  two  incompatible  ?  Not  at  all.  But  reconcile 
them  and  you  ruin  your  smart  saying;  there's  the  rub. 
'Surely,  there  is  a  time  for  dreaming  and  a  time  for 
dining;  there  is  Scripture  warrant  for  the  idea.  It 
were  the  better  wisdom  to  let  the  years  refine  the  palate 
to  the  civilized  pleasures  of  the  table,  and  elevate  our 
dreams  until  they  rise  to  the  prophetic  vision  of  the 
seer.  The  dream  must  be  of  the  right  sort.  If  you 
do  not  dine  well,  the  dream  may  be  of  the  other  kind, 
even  the  dream  that  is  called  nightmare.  The  homely 
and  the  high  have  a  sure  connection,  and  woe  to  him 
who,  in  cultivating  his  soul,  neglects  his  stomach;  for, 
with  an  empty  stomach,  there  can  be  naught  but  an 
emptiness  and  a  carking  cynicism  in  the  soul. 

How  then  shall  middle  age  alter  the  callow  sen- 
tence :  "  At  twenty  we  dream,  at  forty  we  dine  "  ? 

Let  it  be  written :  "  At  twenty  we  dream,  at  forty 
we  are  still  dreaming,  for  all  men  are  dreamers  until 
they  die  —  and  after."  This  is  the  allegory  of  an  epi- 
gram and  the  years. 


102 


ffieneatb  tbe  £bre0bol& 

EVERY  man  leads  three  lives:  the  life  social,  in 
relation  to  his  friends,  and  the  world  in  gen- 
eral; the  life  psychic,  in  which  he  communes  with  his 
own  spirit;  and  the  subliminal  life,  expressing  itself  in 
flashes  and  surges  of  living  that  wonderfully  excel  his 
usual  self.  For  the  most  part,  he  is  walking  on  the 
plain,  where  he  is  one  of  a  vast  number  making  up  the 
social  complex.  Occasionally  he  dives  into  the  depths 
of  his  own  being,  to  rediscover  his  soul.  And  still 
more  infrequently  he  is  lifted  to  the  heights  of  in- 
spiration by  the  urge  of  forces  which,  below  the  thresh- 
old of  his  conscious  life;  seize  upon  him  momentarily, 
and  turn  him  from  man  into  demigod. 

We  know  comparatively  little  as  yet  of  the  powers 
and  possibilities  of  this  strange  third  self  in  man. 
What  are  its  boundaries  ?  Under  what  stimulus  will  it 
rise  into  consciousness  and  alter  our  lives?  Is  it  pri- 
marily intellectual  in  character  or  the  child  of  emo- 
tional experience?  And  so  on  with  many  another 
flocking  question, —  since  the  field  is  new  to  investiga- 
tion, and  human  psychology,  under  the  modern  micro- 
scope, has  taken  on  an  aspect  radically  differing  from 
the  older  philosophical  conceptions.  Is  this  mysterious 
103 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  SLife 

part  of  a  man,  which  is  apparently  beyond  the  control 
of  his  will  and  outside  the  realm  of  his  consciousness, 
the  result  of  all  his  past  life,  or  is  it  ancestral,  so  that 
an  act  of  his  dictated  by  his  subliminal  self  is  really 
his  forbears  working  in  him?  Or  does  it  go  back  far 
earlier  to  a  racial  impulse?  Or  may  it  be  called  the 
imperial  will  of  the  whole  of  humanity,  expressing 
itself  through  one  puny  personal  medium?  These  are 
vast,  awe-inspiring  suggestions,  shading  off  into  oriental 
mysticism  on  the  one  hand,  or  becoming  tangled  with 
the  puerilities  of  pseudo-spiritualism,  or  diving  deep 
down  into  the  arcana  of  the  human  spirit  as  revealed 
in  the  laboratory  by  the  scalpel  of  science. 

Whatever  the  explanation,  and  however  sure  we  may 
already  be  that  the  progress  of  science  will  bring  us  in 
good  time  to  a  clear  understanding  of  the  mystery  be- 
neath the  threshold,  it  is  well  at  the  present  time  to 
appreciate  this  capacity  of  man  for  rising  above  his 
normal  self,  its  importance  in  his  higher  life,  and  that 
of  the  race ;  and  its  implications  for  religion,  literature, 
philosophy,  and  daily  life.  It  were  a  mistake  not  to  un- 
derstand that,  just  as  a  great  ocean  steamer  has  by  far 
its  larger  part  beneath  the  surface  of  the  water  and 
hence  invisible,  so  man's  hidden  part,  rarely  coming 
into  view,  may  be, —  although  with  some  persons  never, 
—  a  large  and  potent  portion  of  his  personality. 

In  literature,  to  say  a  word  on  that  particular  appli- 
cation of  the  thought,  it  means  what  has  been  tra- 
ditionally called  "  inspiration,"  as  in  religion  it  implies 
104 


Beneatb  tbe  Ubresbolfc 

"  conversion," —  the  spirit  of  God  descending  upon  a 
soul  hitherto  unclaimed.  An  author  is  inspired,  we 
say;  what  do  we  mean?  Surely,  that  he  achieves  that 
which  he  is  not  aware  to  be  within  his  power;  ex- 
hibits a  gift  (note  the  word)  rather  than  a  recognized 
capacity;  transcends  for  a  little  his  everyday  controlled 
ability.  I  was  once  taking  an  afternoon  walk  with  a 
distinguished  novelist  whose  mornings  were  just  then 
engaged  in  the  writing  of  a  piece  of  fiction  now  re- 
garded as  among  the  best  American  works. 

"  How  did  you  get  on  to-day?  "  I  asked. 

"  Not  very  well,"  was  the  reply;  "  I  did  not  surprise 
myself  once." 

It  is  this  element  of  surprise  for  the  author  which 
gives  to  a  creative  literary  work  that  quality  whereat 
the  reader  catches  his  breath  and  feels  his  soul  uplift. 
Of  old,  as  the  word  "  inspiration  "  shows,  we  deemed 
it  came  from  on  high;  in-spiro,  we  breathed  it  in. 
Now,  guided  by  science,  we  derive  it  from  below;  up 
it  wells  from  the  regions  of  unconscious  cerebration 
whose  central  station  rules  our  lives,  into  the  tiny  area 
where  self-consciousness  reigns  and  the  will  works  with 
seeming  supremacy.  But  from  whithersoever  it  come, 
it  is  beyond  volitional  control,  that  is  the  main  point; 
and  a  feeling  of  awesome  wonder  is  properly  begotten 
for  this  reason  as  we  watch  its  workings:  an  "  Ode 
to  a  Nightingale  "  from  a  Keats,  a  "  Fall  of  the  House 
of  Usher  "  from  a  Poe,  an  "  Unfinished  Symphony  " 
from  a  Schubert. 

105 


Xittle  J608a£8  in  ^literature  anfc  %ffc 


To  argue  that  it  is  not  only  independent  of  our  will- 
power at  the  moment  of  its  appearance,  but  aside  from 
any  control  we  may  exercise  or  act  we  may  perform, 
would  land  us  in  fatalism,  pure  and  simple.  Then  are 
we  indeed  the  sport  of  ancestry  and  race,  a  frail  mech- 
anism pushed  on  to  our  doom  by  blind  subconscious 
force.  But,  contrary  to  this  depressing,  nay,  paralyz- 
ing, idea  there  is  much  to  justify  the  faith  that  it  is  in 
accordance  with  the  tenor  of  our  whole  lives,  along 
with  the  operation  in  us  of  the  ante-natal  influences 
and  those  summed  up  in  the  words  "  education  "  and 
"  environment  "  that  the  flash  of  inspiration  comes  ; 
that  the  tongue  of  the  man  of  letters  is  suddenly  tipped 
with  fire,  and  the  man  of  God  speaks  for  the  nonce  as 
never  man  spake. 

In  close  alliance  with  this  dimly  guessed  power  are 
the  unconscious  or  semi-conscious  visions  of  sleep;  the 
dreams  that  seem  prophetic  of  coming  events,  like 
Joseph's  aforetime,  and  the  subtle  telepathic  communi- 
cation of  man  with  man,  or  animal  with  man.  A  field, 
this,  as  fascinating  as  it  is  immense,  and  so  far  the 
trails  across  it  are  hardly  blazed  by  the  pioneers  of 
psychic  investigation.  A  clergyman,  who  in  his  day 
was  regarded  as  a  pulpit  orator  of  high  rank,  told  me 
that,  leaving  his  unfinished  sermon  Saturday  night  at  a 
difficult  point  in  the  argument,  he  had  come  to  know 
that  the  solution  would  be  given  him  in  sleep,  and  his 
Sunday  task  successfully  completed.  Readers  of  that 
son  of  genius,  Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  will  remem- 
106 


JBeneatb  tbe  Ubresbolfc 

her  his  delightful  and  remarkable  essay  on  the  "  little 
people,"  as  he  called  them,  in  "  A  Chapter  on  Dreams." 
He  referred  to  the  imps  of  his  imagination  who,  while 
he  lay  asleep,  set  the  stage  for  him  in  a  lighted  theater 
where  was  played  out  for  his  delectation  many  a  dra- 
matic story,  sometimes  interrupted  by  an  early  awaking, 
but  often  played  to  the  end  and  so  furnishing  the  great 
romancer  with  fiction  ready-made  to  his  hand. 

"  How  often,"  exclaims  Stevenson,  "  have  these  sleep- 
less Brownies  done  me  honest  service,  and  given  me, 
as  I  sat  idly  taking  my  pleasure  in  the  boxes,  better 
tales  than  I  could  fashion  for  myself."  And  then,  to 
prove  how  vivid  were  such  memories,  the  novelist  nar- 
rates one  of  the  stories,  "  exactly  as  it  came  "  to  him. 
And  he  adds  the  curious  information  that  his  printed 
tale,  "  Olalla,"  was  given  to  him  in  this  way,  he  merely 
adding  the  scenery,  two  characters  and  the  moral,  "  such 
as  it  is."  Here  is  one  instance,  where  many  similar 
could  be  named,  of  the  magic  of  the  Mage,  who,  behind 
the  scenes  of  life,  moves  us  to  great  issues  and  bids  us 
remember  the  world  beneath  the  threshold,  and  respect 
its  might. 


107 


local  fiDln50 

DOES  any  one  of  your  friends  write  a  letter  quite 
so  charming  in  a  chatty,  informal  way  as  he  — 
it  is  more  likely  to  be  a  she  —  who  has  a  local  mind? 
I  mean  the  mind  keenly  interested  in  local  happenings, 
on  the  qm  vive  for  neighborhood  gossip  and  quick  to 
gather  the  very  latest  news.  How  good  it  is,  when 
away  on  your  vacation,  to  receive  a  missive  from  this 
kind  of  correspondent,  who  is  left  in  town, —  it  gives 
you  such  a  feeling  of  superiority  when  you  are  able 
to  be  away  yourself, —  from  whom  you  learn  just  what 
you  want  to  know:  who  is  married  or  engaged  to  be, 
the  strange  mishap  of  Mr.  Blank  and  the  startling  good 
fortune  of  Mrs.  Blandish, —  all  the  social  chitchat  that 
is  so  small  yet  bulks  so  big  within  the  little  confines  of 
your  particular  experience. 

It  is  all  conveyed  with  a  light  touch  and  in  a  confi- 
dential tone,  so  that  the  talk  on  paper  trips  along  as 
easily  as  if  it  were  by  word  of  mouth.  As  a  rule,  you 
will  not  find  this  pattern  of  person  overly  interested  in 
large  general  affairs,  unless  such  are  by  chance  related 
to  the  local ;  but  for  the  latter  he  has  an  absolute  genius. 

Naturally,  the  degeneration  of  this  excellent  faculty 
gives  us  the  quidnunc,  the  town  nuisance,  the  vicious 
108 


Xocal  /HMn&s 

gadder-about.  But  in  its  place  and  in  its  purity,  it  is  as 
refreshing  as  a  northwest  wind  on  a  mid- August  day: 
refreshingly  human,  heart-warming  and  homely  in  the 
way  it  gets  into  your  liking,  it  and  the  individual  who 
possesses  it. 

For,  after  all,  it  is  but  right  and  natural  that  one's 
interest  should  start  with  the  local.  If  charity  begins 
at  home,  so  do  many  other  things.  To  the  countryman, 
the  little  doings  of  the  village  and  countryside  are  of 
deep  concern,  and  his  excitement  over  some  bucolic  de- 
tail provokes  but  shallow  scorn,  since  it  is  all  a  matter 
of  scale.  We  denizens  of  the  town,  pluming  ourselves 
on  wider  views  and  reviews,  forget  that  here  again,  if 
we  but  shift  the  point  of  observation  to  that  of  some 
superior  order  of  being  —  regarding  mortal  affairs,  as 
it  were,  from  Mount  Olympus  —  the  smallness  and  pro- 
vinciality are  quite  as  truly  present.  How  the  impor- 
tance of  a  world-capital  like  London  shrinks  to  nothing 
in  the  light  of  stellar  imaginings! 

There  is  something  sound  and  sweet  in  this  tying  up 
to  the  local,  this  firm  basing  of  the  feet  upon  the  near 
and  the  known.  A  White  of  Selborne  or  a  Thoreau  at 
Walden  makes  the  whole  world  cognizant  of  an  obscure 
spot  on  the  face  of  the  earth,  not  so  much  because  of  its 
intrinsic  merit  as  for  the  reason  that  the  naturalist  him- 
self found  there  what,  being  what  he  was,  he  would  have 
found  anywhere :  to-wit,  a  revelation  of  the  wonders  of 
Nature,  her  wondrous  manifestations  and  her  no  less 
wondrous  laws.  Emerson,  lofty  idealist  as  he  was,  with 
109 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 

his  head  so  often  in  the  clouds  or  above  them,  never- 
theless knew  and  loved  the  earth,  and  his  work,  as  a 
result  of  this  trait,  has  a  delightful  earthy  smack,  a 
plain,  vernacular  reality. 

Hence,  there  is  no  contradiction,  necessarily,  between 
the  mind  with  a  local  tinge  and  bias  and  the  world-view 
of  the  philosopher,  poet  or  historian.  Rostand  in  a 
lovely  line  tells  us  we  can  see  a  star  in  a  dewdrop;  so 
may  we  see  all  human  nature  crystallized  in  the  home- 
liest, most  rustic  specimen  of  the  race,  and  range  all 
history  at  a  village  town-meeting, —  if  but  the  eye  that 
looks  on  be  discerning. 

The  local  mind  in  literature  has  always  been  a  power. 
Carlyle,  a  Scotch  peasant,  comes  down  to  London  and 
eventually  is  recognized  as  a  giant  of  English  letters, 
just  because  he  preserves  the  native  burr  to  his  speech 
and  the  simple,  deep  faith  in  certain  spiritual  funda- 
mentals inculcated  at  his  mother's  knee.  Burns,  an- 
other peasant  of  the  same  great  people,  was  always  most 
potent  in  his  song  magic  when  he  sang  of  what  he  saw 
in  his  native  haunts, —  the  wee  mousie,  the  cotter  in 
his  humble  home,  the  bonnie  lass  the  bard  loved.  Burns 
in  Edinburgh,  trying  to  write  pure  English  and  be 
literary,  is  a  rather  sad  spectacle. 

It  is  astonishing  how  often  some  small  place  has 
cradled  and  inspired  the  master  minds  of  the  world, — 
a  place  that  might  impart  the  local  color  to  the  genius 
that  was  to  immortalize  it :  Socrates,  Sophocles,  Euripi- 
des, and  the  other  Greek  immortals  at  Athens,  Goethe 
no 


OLocai 

and  Schiller  in  Weimar,  Emerson  and  Hawthorne  in 
Concord.  It  almost  seems  as  if  the  best  way  to  be  uni- 
versal were  to  be  local,  "  true  to  the  kindred  points  of 
heaven  and  home,"  as  Wordsworth  has  it. 

The  most  effective  way  of  bringing  home  to  the  mind 
general  principles  and  abstract  propositions  is  to  be  con- 
crete; to  teach  by  parables,  as  did  the  Lord  himself. 
There  is  a  type  of  great  man,  of  whom  Lincoln  is  a  fine 
example,  which  has  the  habit  of  illuminating  some  great 
and  serious  matter  of  conduct  by  the  introduction  of 
some  homely  saw  or  story,  the  application  of  which  con- 
veys the  lesson.  Those  homely  yarns  of  the  great  presi- 
dent, how  they  did  their  work  and  how  memory  treas- 
ures and  repeats  them !  To  the  unthinking,  at  the  time 
they  may  have  seemed  merely  undignified,  inappro- 
priate, a  piece  of  rather  coarse,  unrelated  western 
humor.  •  But  we  see  now  that  they  relieved  the  terrible 
strain  of  tragic  life  and  in  their  sane,  direct,  homespun 
fashion  taught  the  people  truths  as  the  language  of 
formal  philosophy  never  could. 

When  somebody  remarked  that  Seward  did  n't  be- 
lieve in  the  Bible,  Lincoln  replied :  "  No  wonder,  he 
did  n't  write  it  himself."  Could  you  by  any  other 
method  get  so  succinct  a  summary  of  a  certain  trait  of 
the  man  in  question?  Lincoln  had  a  local  mind,  in 
the  finest  sense,  and  when  Lowell  called  him  "  the  first 
American,"  this  among  other  things  must  have  been  in 
his  thought. 

There  has  been  from  the  first  in  the  American,  re- 
iii 


Xtttie  Essass  in  ^literature  anfc  SLife 


garded  as  a  variant  of  the  English  stock,  this  union  of 
the  local  and  the  general,  of  the  practical  and  the  ideal- 
istic. Adventuresomeness  and  a  utilitarian  object  were 
behind  the  American  settlement,  and  our  forefathers 
came  over  on  a  search  for  land  and  subsistence,  feeling 
the  general  urge  for  conquest  and  discovery  marking  the 
Elizabethan  era.  And,  on  arrival,  heaven  knows  the 
practical  was  forced  upon  them:  the  country  had  to  be 
made  habitable,  dangers  from  man  and  nature  removed, 
and  civilization  established.  But  along  with  this  im- 
mediate, stern  necessity,  and  beneath  it  as  a  motor  force, 
went  the  dream  and  the  ideal:  freedom,  civil  and  reli- 
gious, sought  and  found,  and  a  set  of  convictions  that 
spelled  hope,  faith,  and  the  democratic  love  of  liberty. 

The  local  mind  is  the  salt  of  character.  If  it  does 
not  broaden  out  into  general  adaptability,  it  falls  short 
of  the  desirable  stature;  but  when  it  stands  on  mother 
earth  and  peers  heavenward,  behold  the  full  measure 
of  a  man! 


112 


falling  in  Xove 

ONE  of  the  most  curious  phrases  in  English  speech 
is  this  of  "  falling  in  love,"  so  familiar,  so 
steadily  before  us  that  we  do  not  see  its  full  meaning. 
Regard  it  carefully  for  a  moment.  In  the  company 
of  another  human  being  we  appear  to  have  had  an  ac- 
cident ;  we  have  fallen,  with  her,  into  something  yclept 
"  love."  Love  seems  to  be  not  so  much  within  the  two 
persons  involved,  as  outside  of  them,  awaiting  their 
coming,  biding  its  time  for  spell-weaving  and  for  lure. 
Similarly,  the  expression,  "  I  am  in  love  with  her," 
bears  out  the  same  idea  on  analysis;  once  again  a  joint- 
experience  is  implied,  and  an  experience  not  the  ex- 
clusive possession  of  this  particular  pair  of  mortals,  but 
open  to  the  race. 

It  is  as  if,  walking  on  the  shore  of  life  beside  the  sea 
of  love,  he  and  she  decided  to  jump  in  and  get  the  ex- 
hilaration of  the  great  change;  so  in  they  go, —  they 
have  fallen  in  love  and  felt  the  vast  heave  of  its  tide,  the 
tonic  of  its  waves,  and  perhaps  the  danger  of  its  under- 
tow. But  in  their  passion  they  find  joy  in  the  tempests 
of  this  splendid  sea  and  delight  in  the  unseen  treacheries 
of  its  depths. 

Vernacular  turns  of  speech  usually  hide,  if  they  do 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xite 

not  at  first  reveal,  the  truths  of  life,  and  this  is  no  ex- 
ception. A  deep  philosophical  meaning  lies  in  this 
pungent  idiom.  It  is  a  meaning  touched  upon  by  Emer- 
son in  his  great  essay  on  love,  where  he  declares  that 
the  beautiful  human  relation  so-called  has  for  its  highest 
aim  and  object  the  training  of  the  soul  to  a  comprehen- 
sion of  what  love  is,  that  mighty  and  mystic  principle 
which  governs  the  universe.  The  particular  love  leads 
on  to  one  that  is  wider  and  includes  all  and  everything. 
"  Thus  are  we  put  in  training,"  says  Emerson,  "  for  a 
love  which  knows  not  sex,  nor  person,  nor  partiality, 
but  which  seeks  virtue  and  wisdom  everywhere,  to  the 
end  of  increasing  virtue  and  wisdom." 

Is  this  idea  philosophic  at  the  expense  of  the  heart- 
warming, ordinary  way  of  looking  at  it,  which  insists 
that  the  beloved  is  the  sum  and  substance  of  all  earthly 
(and  heavenly)  things?  Is  it  not  an  affront  to  some- 
thing sacred  to  suggest  that,  by  a  sort  of  trick  of  Na- 
ture, this  sentiment  is  for  our  training,  far  beyond  its 
immediate  result  in  the  satisfaction  of  two  souls,  each 
all  in  all  to  the  other? 

Not  at  all,  for  the  very  good  reason  that  the  lovers 
pay  no  heed  to  this  ulterior  lofty  aim  of  the  universe 
nor  believe  it  for  one  moment.  The  splendid  outer 
world,  the  ordered  phenomena  of  sky  and  air,  of  hill 
and  plain  and  valley,  of  land  and  sea  and  the  dimpled 
isles  that  make  lovely  the  great  waters,  are  only  so 
much  stage-setting  for  the  eternal  drama  of  two  in  love. 
Like  Romeo  and  Juliet,  they  use  the  stars  as  their 
114 


in  %ox>e 

private  symbols,  and  pile  Ossa  on  Pelion  of  protesta- 
tions, the  best  possible  use,  to  their  minds,  for  those 
mighty  mountains  and  the  justification  of  their  ex- 
istence. Bird  songs  are  choristers  at  their  bridal  service 
and  flowers  but  open  to  sprinkle  sweet  odors  along  their 
festal  path. 

This  superb  self-centeredness  is  altogether  right,  the 
world  feels ;  and  those  who  look  on  applaud,  recall  their 
own  trysting,  and  sigh  that  it  is  but  a  memory.  To 
this  beautiful  pair  of  babes,  all  the  love  language  of  the 
past  lovers,  set  down  in  books  or  made  dear  in  a  hun- 
dred other  ways  of  art,  is  simply  so  much  ready-made 
material  for  their  use,  lest  they  be  unable  of  themselves 
completely  to  express  their  rapture.  They  have  heard 
of  love,  and  of  falling  in  love,  all  their  days,  before  the 
Great  Adventure  came  their  way ;  yes,  have  even  smiled 
pityingly  at  the  extravagances  of  other  of  the  chosen; 
now,  at  last  and  for  the  one  and  only  time,  they  are 
ready  to  swear,  they  have  left  the  shore  and  are  breast- 
ing the  billows,  and  have  already  begun  to  know 

— the  divine  intoxication 

Of  the  first  league  out  from  land. 

It  is  this  unconsciousness,  this  self-absorption,  which 
adds  a  touch  of  pathos  to  the  spectacle  of  lovers  and 
offers  to  the  ironic  mind,  as  well,  a  chance  for  thought- 
ful amusement.  Yet  have  the  lovers  altogether  the 
best  of  it.  They  are  not  dupes,  because  they  are  under- 
going one  of  the  highest  and  holiest  experiences  life 


Xittie  J6ssa8  in  ^Literature  a^  %ife 


can  give;  they  have  the  utilitarian  justification  to  be 
found  in  the  fact  that  their  union  makes  the  home  pos- 
sible and  the  state  therefore  secure;  and  the  idealistic 
justification  that  falling  in  love  is  the  first  step  of  a 
progress  of  which  the  far-off  ultimate  goal  is  that  mystic 
oneness  with  the  universal  principle  of  Love  which 
moves  the  worlds,  and  yet,  man  believes,  is  personal  ; 

L'amor  che  move  il  sole  e  I'altre  stelle. 

Moreover,  the  spectacle  radiates  out  upon  life,  upon 
the  unfortunate  multitudes  of  those  not  in  the  experi- 
ence, all  manner  of  sweet  influences  that  help  mankind 
to  live,  and  better  human  conditions.  That  is  why  great 
literature,  in  handling  this  solar  event,  exhibits  this 
helpfulness  in  many  ways  ;  it  would  not  be  fundamental 
if  it  did  not  do  this  service.  Thus,  in  "  Romeo  and 
Juliet  "  —  to  take  an  instance  of  which  we  have  recently 
been  reminded  by  witnessing  the  play,  —  the  star-crossed 
lovers  are  led  to  the  door  of  a  tomb,  there  to  perish. 
Were  that  the  end  of  the  drama  as  conceived  by  the 
poet,  it  would  be  a  purely  fatalistic  presentation  of  love. 
The  immortal  twain  met,  fell  in  love,  tried  to  sur- 
mount circumstances,  failed,  and  in  the  flower  of  their 
youth  and  the  heyday  of  their  splendidly  white-souled 
passion,  died  untimely,  ere  they  had  more  than  begun 
their  love  pilgrimage  together. 

Here  is  the  moment,  alas,  where  the  garbled  version 
of  the  play  concludes  and  this  is  utterly  wrong.  For  in 
the  complete  text  the  reconciliation  of  the  rival  houses 
116 


jfalltng  in  3Lo\>e 

follows  the  death,  which  thus  accomplishes  a  most  desir- 
able good.  Out  of  death  comes  life,  and  the  divine 
principle  of  love  triumphs  over  a  feud  that  stands  for 
the  terrible  opposing  principle  of  hate. 

Much  of  the  modern  cuttings  of  Shakspere's  dramas 
has  a  certain  excuse,  in  that  under  the  limitations  of 
time  in  the  modern  playhouse  the  whole  drama  cannot 
be  given.  With  the  entr'acte  now  in  vogue,  Shakspere's 
"  two  hours  traffic  of  the  stage  "  would  be  prolonged  to 
three  hours  or  more,  if  the  entire  play  were  enacted. 
But  in  the  case  of  "  Romeo  and  Juliet "  it  is  genuine 
mutilation  to  remove  an  ending  which  would  add  but 
a  very  few  minutes  to  the  playing  time  and  which  is  the 
philosophic  relief  and  poetic  justification  of  the  too 
poignant  tragedy  of  the  tomb  scene.  It  is  a  pity  that 
our  leading  players  do  not  choose  to  give  the  piece  in  its 
entirety,  and  so  let  the  master-poet  say  to  us  that  falling 
in  love,  while  it  may  be  destined  to  meet  an  end  so 
sad,  cannot  fail  to  do  service  to  others,  not  even  lovers 
in  the  first  transports  being  able  to  cut  themselves  off 
from  the  race,  but  rather  leaving  upon  the  air,  breathed 
by  all  who  live,  a  fragrance  that  sweetens,  and  an  ex- 
ample that  stills  strife. 


117 


IRew  acquaintances 

THE  fact  that  we  are  inclined  to  think  so  well  of 
persons  newly  met  is  only  a  phase  of  humanity's 
deep-rooted  feeling  that  the  impossible  may  happen.  It 
is  a  touching  proof  of  the  optimism  which,  in  the  face 
of  all  past  experience,  looks  upon  each  last-made  ac- 
quaintance as  the  Ideal  Personality  of  our  dreams. 
And  so,  often  the  one  thing  needed  to  destroy  the  illu- 
sion is  —  further  intimacy. 

Cynicism  is  quite  out  of  place  in  judging  these  quick 
impressions  and  sudden  decisions  of  the  human  heart. 
Some  one  has  defined  golf  as  "  the  triumph  of  hope 
over  experience  " ;  and  in  a  sense,  why  might  not  the 
definition  apply  to  life  itself?  We  are  all  hoping  for 
the  best,  clinging,  with  counter-testimony  overwhelm- 
ingly to  the  contrary,  to  some  golden  guess,  some  darling 
desire.  And  half  the  joy  of  living,  did  we  but  realize 
it,  lies  in  such  an  attitude  of  mind.  "  I  do  not  wish  to 
live  in  a  fool's  Paradise,"  the  saying  runs;  yet  were 
you  ever  happier  than  before  the  gates  were  shut  upon 
your  foolish  faith  ?  It  is  wrong  to  treat  as  shallow  and 
silly  these  fervent  inclinations  to  seize  on  the  new  ac- 
quaintance, the  companion  elect,  within  an  hour  after 
the  first  meeting,  as  if  a  cheap  nature  were  thus  implied, 
118  ' 


•flew  Hcquaintances 

either  in  you  or  the  just-found  friend.  Friends  tried 
and  true  are  precious,  yes;  the  best  of  all,  if  you  will. 
But  friendships  famed  in  history  and  blazoned  in  litera- 
ture have  been  of  another  sort:  to  meet  and  know,  to 
look  and  love,  to  let  the  reason  wait  upon  the  heart's 
pronouncement, —  this,  too,  is  wise  at  times. 

Who  can  ever  forget  that  first  meeting  of  Dante  with 
Beatrice?  One  glance,  and  his  fate  was  sealed  for- 
ever, and  the  lady,  whether  on  earth  or  in  heaven,  has 
become  for  all  after  time  a  type  of  the  spiritual  affection 
which  transcends  the  flesh.  And  did  not  Shakspere 
ask  us  in  the  sonnet,  "  Who  ever  loved  that  loved  not 
at  first  sight  ?  "  with  his  own  amatory  experience,  per- 
haps with  the  "  dark  lady  "  filling  his  mind.  In  sudden 
likings  or  loves  there  lurks  that  instinct  of  the  ages 
which  is  Nature's  short-cut  to  knowledge,  and  a  most 
convenient  (if  sometimes  risky)  substitute  for  the  slow, 
cautious,  and  self-conscious  processes  of  reason.  It  is 
that  instinct  which  is  at  work  in  what  is  called 
"  woman's  intuition  " ;  a  power  or  gift  by  no  means 
confined  to  the  sex,  although  confessedly  more  often 
there  than  among  the  masculine  persuasion.  Many  a 
man  has  opposed  one  of  these  intuitive  opinions  to  his 
disaster;  what  he  grandiloquently  called  his  common- 
sense  bade  him  reject  the  spontaneous  judgment,  and 
in  the  sequence  he  regretted  his  failure  to  trust  the 
instant  impression. 

Our  attitude  toward  the  mighty  forces  which  are  im- 
plied, in  one  aspect  or  the  other,  in  such  words  as  "  im- 
119 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  %ife 

pression,"  "  intuition,"  "  instinct,"  and  the  like, 
conducts  us  into  the  fascinating  psychic  world  which  is 
but  just  opening  to  our  modern  scrutiny.  We  are  not 
quite  so  sure  as  of  yore  that  powers  and  principalities 
do  not  exist  beyond  our  ken,  and  that  the  subliminal 
self  has  not  laws  as  yet  but  partially  understood. 
Those  sympathetic  to  oriental  forms  of  thought  boldly 
declare  that,  when  two  persons  display  instantly  an 
almost  magnetic  attraction  for  each  other,  it  signifies 
relationship  in  an  earlier  existence;  this  idea,  or  some- 
thing very  like  it,  crops  out  again  and  again  in  Brown- 
ing's poetry.  Certainly,  most  of  us  have  seen,  if  we 
have  not  been  participant  in,  this  kind  of  instantaneous 
attachment;  and  have  noted  that,  instead  of  being  a 
flash  in  the  pan,  it  endured  the  shocks  of  the  years  as 
well  as  connections  more  sensibly  formed  and  slower  in 
welding.  "  When  Time,  that  breaks  all  things,  has 
broken  the  faith  between  friends  " —  Swinburne's  sad 
line  —  does  not  seem  to  apply  to  such  friendships,  which 
to  all  appearances  shine  but  the  brighter  with  the  pass- 
ing of  the  years.  Literature,  past  and  present,  is  full 
of  references  which  point  unmistakably  to  this  senti- 
ment, or  conviction. 

In  a  current  novel  I  chanced  to  be  reading,  "  Dawn 
O'Hara,"  by  Edna  Ferber,  I  ran  into  this  sentence: 
"  We  became  friends,  not  step  by  step,  but  in  one 
gigantic  leap  such  as  sometimes  triumphs  over  the  gap 
between  acquaintance  and  liking."  The  truth  is,  man- 
kind is  naturally  idealistic.  We  set  clouds  of  glory 

120 


•ftew  Hcquaintances 

round  the  new  acquaintance,  because  we  would  have 
him  so,  and  as  yet  there  is  not  sufficient  inconvenient 
knowledge  about  him  to  make  it  difficult  to  believe. 
So,  too,  if  we  have  a  genius  for  friendship,  we  idealize 
our  friends  by  simply  assuming  in  them  their  highest 
potentialities,  and  believing  that  they  will  live  up  to 
them.  And  it  will  happen,  with  one  who  is  all  but  a 
stranger,  that  we  can  show  more  of  our  deeper  self  for 
the  very  reason  that  the  other  is  not  aware  of  our 
weaknesses, —  is,  on  his  side,  idealizing  us  as  well ;  and 
cheered  by  this  confidence,  we  expose  psychic  layers 
lying  deeper  down  than  we  ever  go  within  the  bosom 
of  our  families.  And  to  treat  this  experience  as  if  it 
were  an  amusing  example  of  the  double  game  of  bluff, 
were  to  do  it  foul  wrong.  In  one  of  those  thrusts  into 
human  psychology  which  make  her  a  great  writer, 
George  Eliot  declared  that  we  are  always  under- 
estimating or  overestimating  each  other ;  it  is  only  God 
who  can  see  us  as  we  are.  He  strikes  the  balance. 

But  it  is  very  safe  to  say  that  he  who  assumes  the 
best  in  another  hits  nearer  to  the  fact  than  he  who  as- 
sumes the  worst.  That  first  rosy  estimate  of  the 
new-found  friend,  so  generously  taken  for  granted,  so 
pathetically  believed  in  and  trusted,  has  a  solid  raison 
d'etre  in  human  nature,  after  all  allowances  are  made  ; 
and  trust  is  a  kind  of  higher  shrewdness.  In  our  an- 
alytic, self-conscious  age,  it  is  probable  that  we  depend 
too  little  upon  the  testimony  of  that  larger  Self  which 
is  outside  of  the  petty  little  Me  I  am  conscious  of: 
121 


SLittte  Bssass  tn  ^literature  an&  %ife 


the  Self  that  means  the  race  with  its  eons  of  experience 
working  in  my  blood  ;  the  Self  that  is  below  the  thresh- 
old of  consciousness,  yet  potent  to  push  me  on  to  my 
destiny  ;  the  Self  that  is  ancestral,  the  combined  wisdom 
or  foolishness  of  all  my  forbears  influencing  my  every 
act;  or  the  Self,  if  the  materialistic  explanation  be  ac- 
cepted, which  is  the  result  of  environment  ;  which,  as  a 
French  critic  has  put  it,  "  when  placed  personally  be- 
fore a  question  of  life  or  death,  obeys  no  preconceived 
morality,  but  laws  of  equilibrium  of  a  purely  physical 
character  as  compelling  as  those  of  gravity." 

We  can  well  afford  to-day,  in  view  of  the  opening  up 
of  the  deeper  possibilities  of  personality,  to  trust  this 
more  generously  defined  Ego  of  ours,  and  to  'have  faith 
in  new  friends,  along  with  the  old.  The  intuitions  are 
not  to  be  despised  in  the  light  of  modern  science;  they 
are  to  be  the  more  respected.  Abt  Vogler,  the  com- 
poser, speaking  for  his  own  art,  yet  with  words  wise 
and  beautiful  that  are  of  widest  application,  said: 

"  The  rest  may  reason  and  welcome  ;  'tis  we  musicians  know." 


122 


ffilunbere  an&  Blun&erers 

AN  oft-repeated  phrase  is  ringing  in  my  ears, — 
"  old  enough  to  know  better.'*  Ye  gods,  is  any- 
body so  old,  I  wonder,  as  to  avoid  the  mistake,  to 
check  the  foolish  step,  to  see  the  pitfall  ere  the  foot 
stumble?  I  fancy  not,  else  were  we  machines  rather 
than  men.  We  prate  of  the  wisdom  of  gray  hairs,  and 
like  to  think  of  "  grave  and  reverend  signiors  "  (outside 
the  play)  ;  but  uncover  their  deeds  withal,  and  what 
a  motley  they  would  appear.  Nay,  we  are  all 
blunderers,  even  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave,  and  the 
infinite  compassion  is  in  nowise  more  steadily  engaged 
than  in  forgiving  man  his  lapses  through  the  seven  ages 
of  his  strange,  eventful  history. 

Old  enough  to  know  better,  forsooth!  Lucky  the 
mortal  whose  career  is  not  wrecked,  his  reputation 
ruined,  by  his  fatuous  failure  to  learn  even  the  primary 
rules  of  life's  game,  to  say  nothing  of  the  delicacies  and 
subtleties  that  make  its  technic  so  difficult  a  business. 
When  we  are  come  to  years  of  discretion  we  have 
learned  a  few  things,  granted;  but  yet  how  prone  to 
mishaps  of  our  own  bringing,  how  often  under  the 
white  hairs  of  age  lurk  the  stored  foolishnesses  of 
Time! 

123 


Xfttle  Bssass  in  ^Literature  anfc  3Life 


And  a  blessing  hides  in  this  inept  learning  of  life's 
lesson  by  the  best  of  us.  Our  blunders,  so  many,  so 
egregious,  so  outlasting  the  years,  are  after  all  a  sign 
that  we  are  yet  alive  ;  since  when  we  cease  to  make  mis- 
takes, we  cease  to  live.  This  has  its  frequent  applica- 
tion and  illustration  in  literature.  Contrary,  perhaps, 
to  the  usual  opinion,  the  great  writers  are  not  those 
who  produce  perfect  art-works,  blameless  of  sin  as  they 
are  splendidly  creative  in  their  endeavor.  Not  at  all. 
It  seems  as  if  unequalness  were  a  condition  of  genius. 
Shakspere,  the  supreme  man  of  the  race  in  expression 
and  thought,  is  so  shockingly  bad  at  times  as  to  drive  us 
to  the  theory  that  some  of  the  work  ascribed  to  him  is 
not  his  own.  We  have  long  been  told  that  even  Homer 
nods,  and  the  schoolboy  who  encounters  the  catalogue  of 
the  ships  knows  it  without  the  telling.  When  Dante 
waxes  theological  and  metaphysical  all  the  caressing 
beauty  of  the  terza  rima  cannot  prevent  him  from  being 
frankly  a  bore. 

Or  to  take  a  more  modern  instance:  Thackeray  has 
for  a  generation  been  contrasted  with  Dickens,  his  con- 
temporary and  a  man  of  creative  power,  as  a  master  of 
style,  and  exquisite  artist  of  letters.  And  so  he  surely 
was,  in  the  broad  sense.  But  too  often  this  has  been 
taken  to  mean  that  the  author  of  "  Vanity  Fair  "  com- 
mits no  literary  sins,  while  he  of  Gadshill  is  full  of 
them.  Nothing  could  be  further  from  the  truth.  I 
once  went  through  "  Vanity  Fair  "  with  this  matter  of 
artistic  perfection  in  view,  and  found  that  the  master- 
124 


Blunfcers  anfc  Blunfcerers 

piece  contained  a  surprising  number  of  faults  and  flaws. 
Such  a  sentence,  for  example,  as  "  smiling  and  nodding 
to  his  aunt  in  the  carriage  within  " ;  such  another  one 
as:  "He  used  to  get  drunk  every  night;  to  beat  his 
pretty  Rose  sometimes ;  to  leave  her  in  Hampshire  when 
he  went  to  London  for  a  parliamentary  session,  without 
a  friend  in  the  wide  world,"  simply  illustrate  the  fact 
that  Thackeray  wrote  under  pressure  for  serial  publica- 
tion and  did  not  use  the  labor  of  the  file  as  would  an 
author  of  the  same  class  to-day.  For  the  same  reason, 
on  a  certain  page  old  Osborne  is  informed  of  George's 
regiment  going  to  war;  and  ten  pages  later  hears  of  it 
again  as  if  brand-new.  Or  again:  the  author,  having 
claimed  the  privilege  "  of  peeping  into  Miss  Amelia's 
bedroom,"  asks  why  he  should  not  declare  himself  the 
confidant  of  Rebecca  as  well ;  overlooking  the  primary 
principle  that  in  writing  a  novel  in  the  third  person,  the 
right  to  know  everything  about  the  characters  is  assumed 
and  granted.  Yes,  there  are  plenty  of  these  lapses  in 
a  very  great  book, —  though  from  laziness,  fear  of  con- 
vention or  ignorance  of  artistic  canons,  the  whole  truth 
has  not  been  set  down  in  print.  But  does  it,  or  rather 
should  it,  materially  change  our  estimate  of  this  giant 
of  the  mid- Victorian  period?  By  no  means.  Inci- 
dentally, it  should  serve  to  stop  the  silly  comparison  set 
up  between  Dickens  and  Thackeray,  as  if  the  sins  of 
omission  and  commission  were  all  on  one  side.  The 
truth  is  that  both  these  major  men  wrote  at  a  time 
and  under  such  conditions  as  to  make  a  more  careless 
125 


Xittle  Essaps  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

technic  than  that  of  to-day  inevitable;  of  the  two, 
Dickens  worked  harder  at  his  craft  to  perfect  himself 
therein,  than  his  rival.  On  the  other  hand,  Thackeray 
doubtless  possessed  a  finer  sense  of  style.  But  the  out- 
standing consideration  is  that  neither  is  to  be  judged 
by  his  shortcomings.  The  world  remembers  and  loves 
Dickens  for  his  great  comic  creations,  Pecksniff,  Micaw- 
ber,  Sarah  Gamp,  and  a  host  more;  and  treasures 
Thackeray  for  the  superb  chapter  in  Esmond  where 
Henry  returns  from  the  war  to  his  dear  mistress,  that 
"  rapture  of  reconciliation  " ;  or  for  the  death  of  that 
stainless  gentleman,  Colonel  Newcome;  or  for  Becky 
for  the  nonce  admiring  her  husband  as  he  floors  the  evil 
Steyne.  This  duo  of  English  immortals  are  given  their 
very  high  and  sure  place,  not  because  they  avoided  mis- 
takes, which,  being  human  they  did  not ;  but  rather  for 
the  good  and  sufficient  reason  that  they  did  things,  and 
mighty  big,  fine  things  at  that.  Let  it  not  be  forgotten 
that  to  be  good,  in  life,  literature,  and  religion  is  not 
alone  to  obey  a  series  of  sacred  Don'ts,  but  to  do  some- 
thing to  the  glory  of  God  and  the  welfare  of  mankind. 

It  hardly  needs  to  be  said  that  this  is  no  argument 
against  striving  for  perfection  —  in  literature  or  out  of 
it.  Our  ideals  should  express  that  which  at  present 
eludes  our  grasp,  hovering  ever  before  us,  to  lure  us 
forward  to  better  and  better  achievement.  Otherwise, 
in  Browning's  words,  "what's  a  heaven  for?" 

But  it  is  a  frank  recognition  of  what  must  become 
apparent  to  all  who  think  and  grow  as  they  live,  that  to 
126 


JBlunfcers  anfc  IBlunfcerers 

blunder  is  but  to  confess  oneself  human,  and  the  vaunted 
sageness  of  the  years  will  at  the  best  but  mitigate  the 
mishaps  and  mistakes.  If  mortals  did  not  err,  the 
divine  prerogative  of  forgiveness  were  taken  from  the 
creator. 

"  It 's  a  mad  world,  my  masters,"  cries  Shakspere, 
with  all  this  in  mind.  And  Lamb  the  beloved,  in  that 
deep-hearted,  merry,  tender  essay  of  his,  "  All  Fools' 
Day,"  was  of  this  mood  when  he  said:  "  I  venerate  an 
honest  obliquity  of  understanding.  The  more  laugh- 
able blunders  a  man  shall  commit  in  your  company,  the 
more  tests  he  giveth  you  that  he  will  not  betray  or 
overreach  you."  And  a  little  beyond  he  adds  that  "  he 
who  hath  not  a  dram  of  folly  in  his  mixture,  hath 
pounds  of  much  worse  matter  in  his  composition." 

It  is  well  to  think  of  ourselves,  blunderers  born  and 
bred  under  high  heaven,  in  the  spirit  voiced  in  that 
peerless  couplet  out  of  "  Cymbeline  ": 

Golden  lads  and  girls  all  must, 

Like    chimney   sweepers,    come    to   dust 


127 


Hbout 

UNDER  the  ban  of  the  climate  of  the  Northwest, 
and  in  the  quasi-spring,  humanity  gives  way  to 
a  "  rage  of  traveling,"  as  Emerson  calls  it.  It  is 
natural  enough  to  shy  away  from  that  season  which, 
on  some  days  we  are  forced  to  feel,  possesses  all 
the  vices  of  both  winter  and  summer,  with  the  virtues 
of  neither.  Lucky  is  the  man  or  woman,  we  cry, 
who  can  fly  to  the  outlands,  bask  in  tempered  ocean 
breezes,  play  outdoor  games,  and  see  and  smell  the 
prodigal  flowerings  that  go  with  those  more  genial 
zones,  at  a  time  when  some  of  us,  less  favored,  are 
getting  a  new  sense  of  the  difference  between  climate 
and  weather. 

"  Happy  mortal,  whose  purse  and  business  allow  him 
such  hieing  away  to  new  fields  and  pastures  green,"  is 
the  cry  of  the  stay-at-homes.  "  Let  him  who  may,  go 
gadding  about." 

Yet,  be  it  spoken  for  the  comfort  of  those  same  less 
fortunate  folk,  as  well  as  in  the  interests  of  truth,  it  is 
possible  to  form  an  uneasy  habit  of  going  for  its  own 
sake,  and  travel  has  its  dangers,  even  as  its  delights. 
Emerson  gave  forth  of  his  wisdom  upon  this,  in  the 
essay  on  "  Self-Reliance  " :  "  It  is  for  want  of  self- 
128 


(BafcMng  Hbout 

culture  that  the  idol  of  Traveling,  the  idol  of  Italy, 
of  England,  of  Egypt,  remains  for  all  educated  Ameri- 
cans. They  who  made  England,  Italy,  or  Greece  vener- 
able in  the  imagination,  did  so,  not  by  rambling  round 
creation  as  a  moth  round  a  lamp  but  by  sticking  fast 
where  they  were,  like  an  axis  of  the  earth.  In  manly 
hours,  we  feel  that  duty  is  our  place,  and  that  the 
merrymen  of  circumstance  should  follow  as  they  may. 
The  soul  is  no  traveler;  the  wise  man  stays  at  home 
with  the  soul,  and,  when  his  duties  call  him  from  his 
house  or  into  foreign  lands,  he  is  at  home  still,  and  is 
not  gadding  abroad  from  himself." 

The  time  of  year,  the  geography  of  your  habitat  and 
your  state  of  health  will  doubtless  condition  the  accept- 
ance of  these  words,  but  that  they  contain  a  piece  of 
truth,  the  thoughtful  will  concede.  There  are  many 
good  things  beyond  the  horizon,  let  us  grant ;  but  after 
all,  to  try  to  run  away  from  oneself  is  like  that  other 
unsuccessful  attempt,  the  trying  to  lift  oneself  by  the 
bootstraps.  Coelum  non  animum,  declares  Horace:  we 
change  our  skies,  but  not  our  dispositions,  when  we 
cross  the  seas  to  other  lands. 

This  tendency  to  gad  about  betwixt  seasons,  how- 
ever, is  not  confined  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  North- 
west, or  to  any  other  section  of  this  vast  panorama  of 
states.  The  American  as  a  type  is  a  ubiquitous,  un- 
easy person.  Indeed,  is  not  his  British  parent  —  how 
much  longer  can  that  phrase  be  used,  when  we  are  so 
fast  assimilating  fifty  nations  in  the  native  Melting 
129 


Xittle  Essays  tn  Xfterature  anfc  Olife 

Pot  —  proverbially  a  globe-trotter?  So  that  we  natu- 
rally enough  take  after  our  sire,  adding  perhaps  an  extra 
volatility  and  velocity  of  our  own.  Whatever  the 
origin  of  this  instinct  to  move  and  to  change, —  climate, 
the  settlement  of  a  new  country  with  its  demands  for 
pioneer  and  emigrant,  shifting  home  and  fresh  enter- 
prise, or  something  in  the  blood  by  inheritance, —  be- 
hold the  American,  by  nature,  practice,  and  desire,  gal- 
loping about  the  globe,  at  home  in  all  countries,  even 
his  own,  which  it  is  said  the  cosmopolite  should  be,  here 
to-day  and  gone  to-morrow,  or,  at  best,  the  day  after; 
and  using  in  the  transit  the  swiftest  method  of  locomo- 
tion known:  the  motor  car  now,  the  aerial  car,  it  may 
be,  to-morrow.  We  talk  of  time  fleeing;  it  is  the 
American  that  flees,  while  Father  Time  sits  by  and 
grimly  watches  this  flitting  phantom  of  mortal  haste. 

The  American  likes  short-cuts  and  quick  circuits. 
He  is  a  little  impatient  of  slow-and-sure  as  a  motto  and 
method.  He  wishes  to  get  to  his  destination  by  the 
most  expeditious  route,  and,  on  arrival,  to  see  all  there 
is  to  see  in  half  a  day,  where  other  stupid  nationalities 
put  in  a  week  over  it;  and  to  be  off  to  the  next  point 
of  interest,  there,  as  before,  to  lead  the  procession  and 
push  sight-seeing  through  by  daylight.  Have  you  not, 
judicious  reader,  sat  in  a  foreign  gallery  and  felt  sud- 
denly apologetic  that  you  had  brooded  half  an  hour 
before  some  masterpiece,  because  there  swept  by  a  group 
of  resolute,  buoyant,  still  pursuing  fellow-citizens  of  the 
Great  Republic,  who  literally  never  stopped  at  all: 
130 


Hbout 

merely  slowed  up  in  front  of  a  Raphael  or  nudged  el- 
bows when  a  Van  Dyck  was  reached  ?  They  had  heard 
of  him  before.  But  art  is  long,  and  luncheon  is  near. 
Onward ! 

Something  of  this  seems  to  get  into  our  business  now 
and  again,  as  the  very  existence  of  such  a  title  as  "  Get- 
Rich-Quick  Wallingford  "  suggests ;  and  into  our  en- 
deavor, too,  in  the  arts  and  letters.  The  American 
yields  to  no  one  in  invention,  deft  skill  of  handling, 
sympathetic  sensitiveness  to  life  and  impressionistic  re- 
sponse to  its  many  motives.  But  he  is  so  anxious  to 
finish  his  job,  and  begin  another  one,  that  his  particular 
temptation  is  to  scamp  his  work.  And  no  one  can 
scrutinize  present-day  literature  for  the  purpose  of  an 
open-minded  comparison  of  English  and  American  pro- 
ductions, without  being  forced  to  the  conclusion  that, 
in  the  matter  of  thoroughness  and  well-turned  art,  our 
kinsmen  overseas  are  easily  our'  superiors. 

This  is  all  the  more  to  be  deplored,  in  that  it  does  not 
mean  inferiority  of  gift  or  less  of  aptitude;  rather,  I 
fear,  does  it  imply  a  certain  inability  of  the  mind  to  stay 
put  long  enough  to  do  a  thing  well,  just  as  the  body 
seems  unable  to  stay  put  in  one  place,  and  so  is  forever 
traveling,  gadding  about.  In  art,  some  of  the  latest 
manifestations  are  plainly,  among  other  things,  the  re- 
sult of  a  purpose  to  dodge  work,  to  get  to  an  effect  at 
a  jump,  and  without  the  slow,  steady,  devoted  labor 
which  properly  underlies  all  genuine  artistic  perform- 
ance. It  is  the  Get-Rich-Quick  Wallingford  idea 
131 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

again,  translated  into  the  realm  of  Beauty.  In  con- 
trast, the  Greeks  had  patience;  and  they  rule  the  cen- 
turies. There  is  no  short-cut  to  artistic  perfection,  any 
more  than  there  is  to  heaven;  you  have  got  to  work 
for  both. 

Here,  as  in  all  things,  the  golden  mean  is  the  guide. 
Never  to  leave  home  for  rest  and  refreshment,  or  that 
storing  and  stimulation  of  the  mind  which  is  culture, 
would  be  silly  indeed.  To  go  for  the  sake  of  keeping 
in  motion  is  foolishness,  a  pitiable  confession  of  weak- 
ness and  lack  of  self-resource.  Similarly,  it  is  well  to 
be  alert,  to  finish  a  task  with  despatch ;  even  to  perceive 
a  joke  the  same  day  it  is  told. 

Artemus  Ward,  it  may  be  recalled,  on  the  occasion  of 
his  first  London  lecture,  informed  his  audience  that 
citizens  who  did  not  understand  his  witticisms  might 
wait  upon  him  the  next  morning  and  have  them  ex- 
plained; and  the  report  is  that  some  trusting  mortals 
came.  Quickness  is  all  right  in  its  place,  but  thorough- 
ness is  essential  to  character;  and  the  gadding  about 
of  either  mind  or  body  should  not  be  suffered  to  injure 
the  home-keeping  habit,  without  which  there  can  be 
no  progress  in  the  arts  of  civilization. 


132 


Hnt>  ©tbers 

WE  all  know  the  familiar  words :  "  Messrs. 
Brown,  Black,  and  White, —  and  others," 
The  "  others "  mean  that,  though  they  belong  in  a 
general  way  in  the  same  classification  with  the  gentle- 
men named,  they  are  too  inconspicuous  for  particular 
mention,  and  therefore  can  be  lumped  under  an  all- 
inclusive  and  convenient  phrase. 

"  Others!  "  Into  that  category  fall  the  vast  major- 
ity of  human  beings;  in  it,  we,  you  and  I,  must  find 
ourselves  some  time,  somewhere;  and  surely,  sooner  or 
later,  by  the  turn  of  Fate's  wheel,  no  matter  what  our 
success  or  eminence  or  merit,  we  must  take  our  place 
with  the  "  others,"  and  be  content  not  to  be  named  with 
the  shining  few  who  stand  for  the  rest  of  us,  and  so 
are  emphasized.  Nor,  to  be  frank,  is  it  altogether 
pleasant  to  be  set  down  thus  with  the  outsiders,  the 
undistinguished  herd ;  respectable,  to  be  sure, —  for  we 
are  at  least  present  among  the  guests, —  but  hopelessly 
ordinary,  merely  one  of  a  number.  Many  a  secret 
heartburn  is  due  to  this  cause;  to  meet  it  with  a  smile 
without,  and  philosophic  content  within,  is  a  severe 
test  of  character  and  a  spiritual  victory,  when  the  feel- 
ing is  conquered. 

133 


Xittle  Bssags  tn  ^Literature  anfc  Otffe 

There  are  a  few  comforting  reflections  for  the 
"  others,"  nor  is  their  case  so  bad,  after  all,  when  it 
is  clearly  observed.  For  one  thing,  the  selection  of 
the  distinguished  few,  over  against  the  nameless 
"  others,"  is  a  very  fallible  proceeding  indeed,  con- 
tinually corrected  by  time,  and  often  guided  by  tests 
that  are  not  at  all  the  tests  of  real  merit  or  service. 
Wire-pulling  may  have  forced  those  names  into  unde- 
served prominence ;  a  quid  pro  quo  secret  trade  may  be 
behind  it,  or  yet  again  a  mere  stupid  mistake.  Perhaps 
it  is  so  evident  that  one  omitted  name  overtops  all  that 
are  mentioned,  that  a  reading  of  the  list  is  provocative 
of  ironic  amusement  on  the  part  of  all  competent  to 
pass  judgment. 

Think,  O  ye  "  others,"  hungry  for  a  little  apprecia- 
tive recognition,  how  many  of  the  greatest  of  earth 
have  been  pushed  scornfully  or  unwittingly  into  the 
same  nameless  class  by  shortsighted  contemporary 
opinion.  Nothing  in  social  history  is  truer  than  that 
the  first  shall  be  last,  and  the  last  first.  Epictetus  the 
slave  does  not  look  like  a  philosopher,  nor  does  it  seem 
probable  that  Beau  Brummel  will  die  in  a  garret.  It 
may  be  rather  cold  comfort  to  be  told  that,  after  death, 
your  name  will  be  sure  to  have  an  individual  flavor, 
although  now  it  is  insignificant;  but  remembering  that 
he  laughs  best  who  laughs  last,  it  should  breed  tolerance 
and  good  nature.  You,  for  instance,  have  not  worked 
underground  and  grubbily  to  escape  from  the  company 
of  your  brothers  uncatalogued ;  you  have  not  stooped 
134 


Hnfc  <S>tbers 

to  any  underhand  action,  neither  bribed  nor  begged  nor 
slandered ;  and  the  thought  is  as  a  tonic  in  the  blood. 

Think,  too,  how  much  you  escape  by  your  incon- 
spicuosity.  Your  time  is  much  more  your  own,  you 
are  far  more  independent,  less  a  slave  than  if  a  horde 
of  selfseekers  disguised  under  the  name  of  friends  and 
acquaintances  was  pestering  your  every  step,  and  leav- 
ing no  moment  you  could  fairly  call  your  private  pos- 
session. The  penalty  of  prominence  is  publicity,  among 
other  drawbacks,  and  while  it  looks  attractive  fror. 
afar,  perhaps,  nearer  seen,  it  turns  out  to  be  mostly 
envy,  irritation,  and  the  wrong  sort  of  excitement. 
Safely  ensconced  with  the  "  others,"  you  can  live  an 
existence  full  of  peace  if  not  excitement,  and  find 
plenty  of  agreeable  companionship  freed  of  some  at 
least  of  the  strut  and  strain  to  be  seen  where  "  Brown  " 
and  "  Black  "  and  "  White  "—  those  symbols  of  em- 
inence —  walk  up  and  down. 

Nor  should  you  undervalue  yourself  and  your  kind. 
Truth  to  tell,  it  is  the  "  others "  who  do  most  of 
the  world's  work,  and  without  them  society  would 
promptly  collapse.  Thinkers  like  Carlyle  have  from 
time  to  time  cried  up  the  mighty  few  who  are  the 
natural  rulers,  and  justify  mankind  to  itself;  but  to 
represent  these  occasional  giants  as  if  they  alone  meant 
progress,  social  evolution,  is  a  notion  both  false  and 
vicious.  No,  the  sound,  democratic  doctrine  is  that 
human  society  is  upbuilded  as  is  the  coral  reef:  to-wit, 
by  uncounted  slow  accretions,  each  contributing  of  his 
135 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^Literature  ant>  Xife 

best,  all  uniting  to  make  what  is  truly  expressive  of 
the  whole  race  of  coral-workers.  And  for  how  long 
that  work  was  carried  on  beneath  the  water,  unseen 
yet  ever  going  on,  and  some  day  sure  to  emerge  from 
the  surface  and  take  the  eye  with  its  white  wonder 
of  beauty! 

The  older  way  of  writing  history  was  to  give 
emphasis  to  a  few  outstanding  events  and  personages. 
Green  and  the  modern  historians  have  shown  us  that 
the  true  story  of  the  English  race,  or  any  other,  is 
the  story  of  the  unsensational  yet  deeply  interest- 
ing development  of  the  common  people,  as  they  have 
gradually  learned  to  cooperate  and  combine  and  so  bet- 
ter the  general  conditions  of  men.  It  is  an  important 
and  lovable  part  of  the  human  family  we  belong  to, 
we  "  others,"  and  there  should  be  pride  in  the  thought, 
not  shame.  "  Brown  "  may  be  a  loud-mouthed  par- 
venu, "  Black  "  as  bad  in  hue  as  his  name  implies,  and 
"  White  "  a  whited  sepulcher,  for  all  we  know. 

Hidden  among  the  "  others  "  may  be  found,  if  but 
we  seek  diligently,  virtues  like  diamonds  unmined,  and 
pearls  such  as  the  sea  is  loath  to  let  go.  Often  does  it 
happen  that  the  philosopher,  disillusioned  of  those  in 
high  places,  finds  his  recompense  in  contact  with  the 
poor  and  humble  and  seemingly  ungifted  sons  of  men. 

And  after  all  is  said,  the  facts  stare  us  in  the  face, 

and  we  must  make  the  best  of  them.     Mathematically 

stated,  it  is  one  chance  in  ten  for  any  of  us  to  get  out  of 

the  class  of  "  others,"  and  legitimate  as  it  may  be  to 

136 


Hnfc  Otbers 

try  honorably  to  enter  the  more  select  list,  to  break  our 
hearts  over  the  failure  is  foolishness  raised  to  the  nth. 
Life,  in  all  that  makes  it  most  worth  while,  still 
stretches  before  us,  if  we  remain  with  the  general,  and 
it  is  extremely  likely  that  our  ego  could  not  have  a 
more  needed  lesson  than  this  gentle  reminder  to  go  back 
where  we  belong,  and  forgather  with  the  numerous 
good  fellows  there  to  be  found.  If  we  form  the  habit 
of  thinking  of  others  rather  than  ourselves,  it  may  well 
be  that  in  losing  our  life  we  may  find  it;  in  any  case, 
peace  and  contentment  will  wait  upon  our  days.  If 
we  stop  trying  to  get  to  the  goal  so  feverishly,  the 
miracle  of  the  goal  approaching  us  may  be  witnessed. 
And  before  we  realize  it,  we  "  others  "  may  be  dignified 
as  individuals  in  lists  of  honor,  respected  for  our 
humility  and  real  worth. 

Yet,  come  to  think  of  it,  Messrs.  "  Brown," 
"  Black,"  and  "  White  "  are  taking  an  unpleasant  duty 
off  our  hands;  somebody  has  to  undergo  the  discom- 
fort of  appearances,  and  it  has  fallen  to  them.  While 
they  are  bowing,  and  scraping,  and  making  set  speeches, 
let  us  go  skating,  or  fishing,  as  the  season  bids,  while 
we  remember  that  it  is  the  daily,  homely  joys  and 
comforts  which  make  life  endurable,  and  even  dear. 


137 


Selfishness  of  l?outb 

IT  is  the  common  observation  that  youth  is  selfish, 
while  maturity  waxes  ever  more  considerate 
toward  others.  Altruism  grows  with  the  years,  and 
what  is  at  first  the  instinctive  desire  for  enjoyment, 
with  a  heedless  disregard  of  the  rights  of  fellow-man, 
becomes,  as  time  chastens  the  natural  impulses  and 
widens  the  experience,  a  wise  and  beautiful  subordina- 
tion of  the  ego  to  the  general  welfare.  We  do  not 
blame  this  early  centering  in  self,  because  we  remember 
ourselves  in  it,  and  understand  that,  normally,  life 
will  correct  the  tendency  and  bring  the  individual  to 
a  broader  comprehension  of  relative  values.  Life, 
innocently,  to  the  child  is  a  game  of  grab;  to  the  sea- 
soned soul,  it  is  a  game  of  self-surrender  for  the  sake 
of  those  we  love. 

To  the  thoughtful  mind,  as  it  scrutinizes  men  and 
women  and  gets  an  ever  clearer  idea  of  what  life  is, 
comes,  recurrently,  a  thought  which  is  not  without  its 
disturbing  power.  We  see  how  often  there  is  a  wide 
divergence  between  protestation  and  performance,  be- 
tween motive  and  deed.  We  realize  that  people  talk 
duty,  when  they  mean  desire;  that  a  purpose  quite 
selfish,  upon  analysis,  lies  beneath  the  vaunted  ac- 
complishment. In  short,  that  the  difference  between 

138 


Selfisbness  of  Koutb 

youth  and  maturity  is  not  that  of  selfishness  and  un- 
selfishness, but  rather  that  between  honest,  uncon- 
cealed action  that  roots  in  a  self-regarding  impulse, 
and  the  action  which,  equally  self-regarding,  masks 
itself  under  an  avowed  high  motive.  There  is  just 
enough  disillusionment  in  watching  human  affairs  to 
suggest  this  solution  to  any  one  who  thinks. 

If  this  were  so,  without  reservation,  then  all  hu- 
manity would  be  selfish,  and  the  scales  would  tip  in 
favor  of  the  young.  For  there  is  something  refreshing 
in  the  blunt  honesty  with  which  sweet  sixteen  expresses 
an  uncomplimentary  opinion  about  you,  and  the  superb 
directness  wherewith  a  lad  of  ten  will  make  no  pre- 
tense of  interest  when  you  in  nowise  can  contribute 
to  his  happiness.  You  are  simply  ignored,  your  value 
is  nil  and  you  are  made  to  know  it.  "If  one  of  us 
would  get  out  of  this  swing,"  said  the  small  boy  to  his 
sister,  "  there  would  be  more  room  for  me." 

There  is  a  sort  of  tonic  in  this  treatment  after  the 
flattery  of  false  friends  and  the  obliquities  of  polite 
usage.  And  when  youth  does  like  you,  and  shows  it, 
the  compliment  is  immense  and  you  trust  it  as  you  do 
the  liking  of  a  dog,  in  whose  affection  there  is  no 
shadow  of  turning.  Honesty  is  always  admirable, 
never  more  so  than  here.  This  thought,  that  man- 
kind has  a  reprehensible  way  of  cloaking  its  pleasures 
and  passions  under  the  smug  name  of  virtue,  duty  and 
the  like,  is  handled  with  brilliant  satiric  force,  and  more 
than  a  modicum  of  truth,  by  Bernard  Shaw,  who 
139 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  OLife 

would  have  the  race  begin  upon  the  firm  underpinning 
of  reality  and  honest  dealing  with  itself. 

No  one  among  recent  writers  has  seen  this  contrast 
between  protestation  and  action  more  clearly  than  John 
Morley.  In  his  "  Compromises  "  he  points  out  how 
innumerable  are  the  evils  brought  upon  mankind  by 
the  failure  of  apparent  virtue  to  be  more  than  apparent, 
by  our  readiness  to  adopt  the  forms  of  conventional 
righteousness  in  order  to  cover  our  real  thoughts.  It 
reminds  us  of  the  baptism  of  the  Germanic  invaders 
of  the  Roman  Empire,  who,  devoutly  accepting  the 
rites  of  Christianity,  went  on  doing  exactly  as  before, 
with  the  comfortable  assurance  that  they  were  now  de- 
fenders of  the  true  faith. 

To  assume  that  this  is  a  complete  statement  of  the 
case  is  to  do  a  real  injustice  to  our  common  human  na- 
ture. Man  does  gain  with  the  years,  unless  he  makes 
a  moral  wreck  of  his  opportunities,  or  is  fatally  handi- 
capped by  heredity  and  environment.  The  deepest 
meaning  of  life  is  to  be  found  in  the  general  spectacle 
of  human  beings,  gradually,  with  many  set-backs  and 
disasters  not  a  few,  evolving  into  altruism,  hu- 
manitarianism,  and  brother-love.  The  rascals  of  the 
world,  to  be  sure,  will  continue  to  hide  behind  alleged 
lofty  purposes ;  but  their  action  in  so  doing  would  have 
no  significance,  were  the  earth  not  full  of  others  whose 
profession  and  practice  are  not  two,  but  one;  and  who 
have  in  some  measure  learned  that  it  is  more  blessed  to 
give  than  to  receive. 

140 


Ube  Selfisbness  of 

The  disturbing  thought  may  serve  its  purpose,  all 
the  same,  if  only,  by  looking  at  childhood,  our  ad- 
miration for  its  natural  honesty  and  openness  be 
quickened,  and  we  make  new  resolve  to  be  more  frank 
in  our  methods,  and  less  subservient  to  conventional 
indirections.  If  straight  dealings,  beyond  the  limit 
of  politeness,  be  refreshing  in  a  child,  maybe  a  little  of 
it  in  a  man,  even  if  it  lay  him  open  to  the  charge  of 
being  brusk  and  blunt,  might  not  be  amiss.  It  is  a 
wholesome  thing,  and  quite  this  side  of  morbidity,  for 
a  person  to  challenge  his  own  motives,  in  order  that 
he  may  avoid  that  pitfall  of  the  inner  life,  self-con- 
gratulation over  an  imagined  spiritual  victory  which, 
closer  seen,  turns  out  to  be  but  cloaked  enjoyment  of 
the  ego.  Even  in  those  moments  when  we  believe  we 
feel 

Through  all  this  fleshly  dress. 

Bright  shoots  of  everlastingness, 

in  the  great  words  of  Vaughan,  let  us  be  sure  we  are 
not  titillating  to  our  own  histrionism. 

The  child  is  beyond  any  question  selfish,  but  not 
with  that  ominous  form  of  selfishness  which  means 
that  life  has  been  lived  to  no  avail.  While  as  modern 
folk  we  can  no  longer  accept  the  Wordsworthian  view 
that 

Trailing  clouds  of  glory  do  we  come 

From  God  who  is  our  home, 

but  must   rather   assume   the   evolutionary   theory   as 

applied   to  man's  spiritual   growth,   and   declare   that 

141 


Slittle  Essays  in  literature  an&  Slife 

maturity  is  further  along  the  way  toward  Bunyan's 
"  Heavenly  City "  than  mere  untried,  instinctive 
youth,  we  can  nevertheless  get  a  needed  lesson  from 
the  child's  plain  dealing  and  strive  to  put  it  into 
practice  in  our  commerce  with  the  sophisticated  grown- 
ups of  our  daily  meeting.  "  Out  of  the  mouths  of 
babes  and  sucklings  "  has  its  application  here  as  else- 
where. How  fine  —  to  say  nothing  about  how  ef- 
fective—  it  would.be,  never  to  protest  a  noble  mo- 
tive, but  to  go  about  our  business  doing  the  best  we 
can,  and  keeping  our  mouth  shut  as  to  the  aim  behind 
the  act. 

Is  there  any  type  of  human  being  you  more  admire 
than  he  who,  quietly,  without  parade,  and  intent  upon 
duty,  leaves  his  work  to  speak  for  itself?  If  he  be  not 
the  Overman,  he  is  well  along  toward  him,  and  wel- 
come wherever  met.  "  The  gentleman  doth  protest 
too  much."  Ah,  how  we  do  ever  suspect  him,  feeling 
that  words  are  cheap  and  works  dear.  And  so  the 
selfishness  of  youth  becomes  at  once  an  object-lesson  in 
the  dangerous  and  the  desirable. 


142 


Criticism  an&  Cant 

TWO  distinct  and  several  kinds  of  folk  are  fre- 
quently confused  in  the  public  mind.  On  the 
one  hand  is  the  type  of  man  who,  with  the  sincerest 
desire  to  make  his  town,  his  state,  his  country,  or  his 
time  advance  in  the  essentials  of  civilization,  animad- 
verts against  whatever  holds  back  the  better  day.  For 
the  very  reason  that  his  motive  is  so  patriotic  and  pure, 
he  does  not  hesitate  to  denounce  and  warn  and  cry  up 
the  worthy  though  unpopular  thing.  And  he  is  quite 
likely  to  be  disliked  by  his  fellow-man,  especially  if  his 
manner  be  aggressive  and  his  urgence  steady. 

Socrates  was  this  sort  of  man,  and  who  can  doubt 
that  the  Athenian,  walking  downtown  of  a  morning,  in 
the  year  410  B.  C.,  did  not  enjoy  being  buttonholed 
by  the  sage;  who  fired  questions  at  him  after  the 
Socratic  method,  and  would  not  let  him  pass  on  to 
where  business  waited  or  Lesbia,  perchance,  smiled. 
The  value  of  this  worker-for-the-general-good  is  seen 
clearer  in  the  perspective  of  time  than  at  close  range; 
and  his  attraction  often  is  inversely  according  to  the 
square  of  the  distance  we  stand  from  him. 

The  other  type,  with  mouth  awry  and  eye  scornful, 
damns  the  present  and  defies  the  past,  which  is  always 
H3 


Xtttle  Essays  In  Xiterature  a^  %tfe 

golden  to  his  vision,  in  sad  contrast  with  the  dull, 
leaden-colored  now.  And  he  does  this,  not  from  any 
sincere  conviction  but  because  he  wins  thereby  a  cer- 
tain reputation  as  a  wiseacre;  and  when  he  opens  his 
mouth,  let  no  dog  bark.  Instead  of  drawing  attention 
to  remediable  evils  and  suggesting  the  way  out  of  the 
woods,  his  ipse  dixit  is  hurled  indiscriminatingly  about 
on  all  sides.  He  takes  intense  joy  in  inditing  alarmist 
articles,  and  is  never  so  happy  as  when  he  can  convey 
the  idea  that  the  distance  between  us  and  the 
"  demnition  bow-wows  "  is  but  a  brief  and  easy  step, 
and  one  we  are  sure  to  take.  Muckraking  is  his  daily 
food,  and  a  prediction  of  a  Wall  Street  panic  is  to  him 
as  a  beverage.  There  are  always  weather  omens  in 
his  mind  which  justify  pessimism  with  regard  to  the 
crops.  And  after  the  most  heart-warming  and  artistic 
entertainment  you  ever  attended,  he  is  ready  with  his 
sneering  qualifier.  The  wonder  of  it  all  is,  that  while 
he  is  not  loved,  indeed,  is  not  seldom  secretly  abhorred, 
he  fools  a  great  many  into  listening  to  him  with  con- 
siderable respect,  and  is  beyond  doubt  responsible  for 
many  a  baseless  fear  and  many  an  abandoned  enterprise, 
so  true  is  it  that  an  effect  of  wisdom  can  be  gained  by 
this  utterly  spurious,  cheap,  and  obvious  method.  And 
it  may  be  feared  that  centuries  will  pass  before  we  reach 
the  enlightened  view  which  will  ride  him  out  of  town 
or  kill  him  at  the  public  expense. 

The  thing  most  to  be  regretted  is  the  confusion  to 
which  I  draw  attention.     It  would  seem  as  if  no  two 
144 


Criticism  an&  Cant 

creatures  were  more  unlike  than  the  worker  for  the 
common  weal  and  the  worker  for  himself,  yet  the 
former  has  to  assume  vicariously  the  sins  of  the  other 
more  than  half  the  time,  and  the  run  of  mankind  ex- 
hibits a  curious  purblindness  to  the  world-wide  dif- 
ference between  the  twain.  The  critic,  in  the  noble 
and  true  sense,  is  believed  to  be  a  critic  in  the  sense 
that  censoriousness  is  a  principle  of  his  mind  and  a 
preference  of  his  heart.  Criticism,  which  properly 
means  a  winnowing  out  of  precious  grain  from  much 
chaff,  always  with  the  purpose  of  pointing  out  the 
good,  is  interpreted  to  mean  envy,  hatred  and  all  un- 
charitableness.  And  one  is  not  deemed  a  critic  by  the 
ignorant,  unless  he  be  possessed  of  a  strong,  vitriolic 
faculty  which  he  must  employ  liberally  when  "  passing 
upon  his  subject." 

Hard  as  this  is  upon  our  worthy  friend, —  the  man 
who  would  help  and  has  the  courage  of  his  convictions, 
—  it  is  far  more  disastrous  for  the  society  which  breeds 
both  these  types.  For  by  failing  to  see  them  apart,  not 
distinguishing  between  a  friend  and  an  enemy,  society 
blocks  the  work,  destructive  and  constructive,  which 
denotes  two  aspects  of  the  same  spirit  of  helpfulness. 
It  is  just  as  patriotic  to  attack  a  bad  thing  as  it  is  to 
build  a  good  thing;  in  fact,  it  often  happens  that  only 
by  pulling  down  the  one  can  the  other  be  put  up. 
Destruction,  then  construction,  is  the  logical  order  of 
progress.  The  clergyman  blamed  for  the  many  things 
he  had  given  up  as  unbelievable  sensibly  replied  that 
145 


%ittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  OLite 

he  had  got  rid  of  them  in  order  to  have  room  for  the 
big,  vital  things  he  did  believe. 

When  James  Russell  Lowell  returned  from  his 
British  ministry,  he  wrote  certain  essays  and  otherwise 
expressed  his  opinion  on  democracy.  The  gist  of  his 
views  was  that  democratic  methods  and  ideals  were 
still  on  trial  in  this  land,  and  by  no  means  was  the 
victory  won,  or  even  the  theory  justified.  Whereupon 
he  was  promptly  assailed  by  newspapers  of  a  sort, 
cried  out  upon  as  a  traitor  to  American  principles  and 
made  the  object  of  much  more  cheap  rodomontade  of 
that  kind.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  was  doing  us  a 
great  service, —  a  first-class  mind,  fresh  from  a  valuable 
experience  which  had  enabled  him  to  make  comparisons, 
giving  his  country  the  benefit  of  thought  all  the  more 
welcome  because,  perhaps,  not  soothing  to  the  national 
vanity,  which  is  always  ready  to  blind  itself  to  its  own 
good. 

In  the  same  fashion,  it  will  be  remembered  how  the 
late  Charles  Eliot  Norton  made  himself  immensely  un- 
popular throughout  the  land,  in  certain  circles,  by  his 
fearless  condemnation  of  our  policy  in  the  matter  of  the 
Philippines.  The  fact  that  we  may  have  disagreed 
with  him  personally  should  blind  no  American  to  the 
truth  that  such  a  man  was  doing  his  land  a  service 
quite  commensurate  with  that  of  any  soldier  on  the 
belted  field;  a  service,  moreover,  taking  courage  of  a 
higher  sort.  Very  few  are  the  men  who  respect  and 
follow  the  still,  small  voice  rather  than  popular  ac- 
146 


Criticism  an&  Cant 

claim.  It  were  far  easier  for  the  Lowells  and  Nor- 
tons,  and  also  far  more  cowardly,  to  enjoy  their  old 
age  in  supine  selfishness,  instead  of  speaking  the  brave, 
ringing  words  intended  to  awaken  the  public  con- 
science. It  will  be  a  happy  day  for  any  country  when 
such  men  are  appreciated  in  their  motives,  and  can 
count  on  the  esteem  which  is  not  the  object  of  their 
endeavor  but  the  accompaniment  of  their  words  and 
their  deeds. 

The  final  thought,  then,  is  the  desirability  of  dis- 
crimination between  types  whose  resemblance  is  but 
superficial,  their  difference  deep.  Let  us  refrain  from 
applying  the  vulgar  word,  "  knocker,"  to  one  who  is  a 
patriot  in  disguise,  and  be  clear-eyed  to  pick  out  the 
other  fellow:  the  man  of  venom  and  egotism  and  self- 
aggrandizement.  For  always  and  ever  is  he  an  enemy 
of  the  people.  It  was  not  Dr.  Stockman,  in  Ibsen's 
play,  who  was  the  enemy,  but  all  the  folk  who  decried 
him  and  tried  to  drive  him  forth  from  among  men. 
They,  who  were  too  timorous  and  self-seeking  to  re- 
form their  city,  yet  heaped  opprobrium  upon  him  who 
would  do  it  for  them.  Society  was  its  own  enemy  in 
turning  to  rend  him. 


^Uncivil  Service 

INCIVILITY  is  not  a  proof  of  sound  Americanism. 
Yet  often  the  treatment  received  by  perfectly 
innocuous  patrons  of  this,  that,  or  the  other  would 
seem  to  imply  that  it  is  derogatory  to  the  dignity  of 
an  official  to  reply  in  pleasant  terms  with  the  deport- 
ment adopted  by  respectable  society,  and  that  common 
politeness  is  a  flaw  in  patriotism. 

The  underling,  in  proportion  to  the  degree  he  is 
under,  seems  to  feel  he  should  make  up  for  his  small 
salary  by  using  the  methods  of  the  hold-up  man.  His 
offense  begins  in  the  fact  that,  if  you  have  the  misfor- 
tune to  belong  to  his  sex,  he  refuses,  whatever  the 
temptation,  to  glance  your  way.  His  answers  are 
mouthed  into  the  desk  before  him,  or  directed  jauntily 
toward  the  passer-by  in  the  street.  This  ruffles  you 
slightly,  perhaps;  but  more  is  to  follow.  His  enuncia- 
tion is  imperfect,  and  when,  through  necessity,  you  re- 
quest him  to  repeat  the  garbled  information,  fuel  is 
added  to  the  flame  of  suppressed  wrath  with  which 
he  endures  your  presence.  His  intonation  is  on  that 
dead  level  of  protest  or  sinking  note  of  despair  which 
leads  you  to  apologize  for  the  fact  that  your  blood  is 
still  circulating. 

148 


mncfx>fl  Service 

You  are  half-minded  to  offer  him  a  loan  of  a  thou- 
sand or  so,  in  order  to  see  if  the  blandishment  would 
relieve  the  icy  constraint  of  temporary  association  with 
one  so  far  beneath  him.  But  a  wiser  thought  re- 
minds you  that  he  is  as  much  beyond  pecuniary  lure  as 
he  is  impervious  to  human  cajolery.  There  is  in 
civilization  to-day  —  so  obviously  a  misnomer  in  the 
premises  —  no  sterner  test  of  one's  self-esteem  than  to 
confront  this  type  of  fellow- American,  and  leave  the 
one-sided  battle  with  a  remnant  of  amour  propre  left 
to  use  next  time. 

But  let  us  be  just.  Should  you  meet  this  awful 
creature  in  his  own  house,  surrounded  by  his  Lares  and 
Penates,  you  would  find  him  almost  human,  a  man 
even  capable  of  waxing  amiable  in  the  bosom  of  his 
family.  It  doesn't  seem  so,  yet  it  may  well  be.  No 
sentient  thing  could  be  as  morose  and  cantankerous 
steadily  as  he  is  when  you  have  the  ill-luck  to  consult 
him  about  a  time-table,  or  a  theater  ticket  or  a  post- 
office  technicality.  He  must  thaw  out  and  look  cheer- 
ful at  dinner,  say,  or  of  a  Sunday  afternoon,  when 
his  wife's  relatives  do  not  come  to  call,  and  he  strolls 
out  with  his  comely  spouse  in  her  very  becoming  new 
hat.  It  may  be  that  his  office  gloom  and  aloofness  are 
the  reflex  of,  or  natural  reaction  from,  his  household 
charm.  If  so,  congratulations  go  to  his  wife  and  chil- 
dren. Here  is  another  kind  of  double  life,  and  the 
difference  between  a  Sunday-school  superintendent  and 
a  yeggman  is  no  greater  than  that  between  our  official 
149 


OLittle  Essays  in  Xfterature  anfc  Xife 

friend  at  home  and  abroad.  The  reflection  softens 
our  dislike  a  little,  but  only  a  little. 

Wonder  is  begotten  when  we  reflect  that  the  con- 
cern for  which  this  ruffian  works  appears  to  be  per- 
fectly satisfied  with  his  activities.  Else  why  employ 
him?  He  continues  to  hold  down  his  job,  and  his 
neckties  are  more  flamboyant  the  longer  you  perforce 
seek  his  advice.  He  has  every  appearance  of  prosperity. 
You  know,  theoretically,  that  no  one  on  earth  could 
receive  a  large  wage  for  such  a  caricature  of  service; 
yet  there  he  is,  gaining  flesh,  and  stout  to  resist  all 
attempts  to  mold  him  into  the  semblance  even  of 
decency. 

If  it  ever  happen  that  you  miss  him  at  the  receipt  of 
custom,  you  have  an  instinct  of  exultation  in  the 
thought  that  maybe  he  has  been  removed  by  the  hand 
of  fate,  and  will  no  longer  make  the  approach  to 
pleasure  or  business  a  horror  that  beggars  descrip- 
tion. But  not  at  all ;  the  chances  are  that  he  has  been 
promoted,  and  become  the  "  man  higher  up."  Of 
course,  you  wish  he  were  still  higher,  so  high  as  to  be 
forevermore  invisible.  But  that  is  your  eccentricity, 
not  his  fault. 

The  saddest  part  of  it  is  that  this  savage,  pressed 
into  public  service  when  every  outraged  instinct  in 
him  cries  for  steady  occupation  as  a  thug,  plumes 
himself,  as  was  hinted,  on  what  he  supposes  to  be  his 
American  spirit  and  style. 

Frankly,  his  kind  is  not  met  in  European  lands, — 
150 


TUncfvfl  Service 

except  as  an  anomaly  that,  upon  protest,  will  be 
quickly  given  its  quietus.  The  untraveled  citizen  of 
this  mighty  republic  when  abroad  —  with  a  few  other 
titles  understood  —  is  at  first  amazed  when,  upon  ask- 
ing some  necessary  query,  the  reply  comes  back  in 
courteous,  well-modulated  language,  and  the  person 
speaking  evinces  seemingly  a  desire  to  expedite  your 
affairs,  and  if  he  can  only  legitimately  do  so,  acquire 
some  of  your  cash.  The  traveler,  wiping  the  mist 
from  his  eyes,  remembers  that  the  companion  of  this 
well-bred  servant  of  the  public  at  home  takes  your 
money  as  a  personal  insult,  and  suggests,  by  manner 
and  facial  expression,  that  you  have  not  come  by  it 
honestly. 

Indeed,  I  have  seen  Americans,  encountering  this 
gentleman-like  behavior  on  the  part  of  one  who  tradi- 
tionally in  the  land  of  the  free  has  the  habit  of  accom- 
modating you  at  the  point  of  a  gun,  knocking  you 
down,  in  the  language  of  Kipling's  Mulholland,  be- 
fore he  "  led  you  up  to  grace,"  become  at  once  suspi- 
cious of  the  individual,  vaguely  uneasy,  because  a  life- 
time of  manhandling  had  left  the  recipients  dazed  in 
the  face  of  the  manners  of  Lord  Chesterfield  in  a  com- 
mercial connection. 

It  is  only  the  "  slick  citizen,"  runs  the  thought  of 
the  American  abroad,  who  can  afford  such  manners; 
he  needs  it  in  his  business.  What  a  shame  it  is  to 
make  the  American  flag  sponsor  for  a  boor!  How 
salutary  to  suggest,  in  every  possible  way,  that  good 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  SLife 

manners  facilitate  business,  and  that  the  carriage  of  a 
gentleman  does  not  imply  putting  on  airs,  or  a  suspi- 
cious past.  The  thought  underlying  the  daily  ruffianism 
of  cheap  officials  everywhere  is  that,  by  an  exhibition 
of  their  quality,  they  convey  the  idea  that  they  are  as 
good  as  anybody  else, —  and  a  trifle  better.  They 
are  aware  that  the  one  intolerable  thing  from  the 
viewpoint  of  an  American  is  any  concession  that  a 
human  being  of  whatsoever  sort  or  description  is  their 
superior.  It  is  their  touching  faith  that  all  men  are 
born  and  continue  to  be  free  and  equal.  They  do  not 
know  that  the  French  phrase  "  liberty,  equality,  and 
fraternity  "  has  been  long  since  defined  as  a  "  dream  be- 
tween two  lies." 

They  have  much  to  learn. 

Pessimism,  however,  is  not  necessary.  The  official 
manners  are  growing  better,  not  worse.  Not  seldom 
nowadays  you  meet  a  clerk  at  the  counter  or  a  theater 
box-office  man  who,  hard  worked  and  put  upon  as  he 
so  often  is,  preserves  all  the  outward  signs  of  gentle 
breeding.  Long  life  to  him,  for  his  advent  means  an 
advance  in  civilization!  It  is  to  our  common  in- 
terest to  eliminate  the  other,  older  kind,  the  pirate  in 
disguise.  We  are  making  strides  forward  in  the  mat- 
ter of  government  civil  service;  attention  should  also 
be  given  to  uncivil  service  in  our  business  life,  private 
as  well  as  public. 


152 


In&tvt&ual  an&  Societ? 

THE  helpless  gregariousness  of  people  who  sit 
about  in  overlighted,  stuffy  rooms  at  summer 
resorts,  languidly  listening  to,  or  taking  part  in,  the 
aimless  talk  that  can  be  called  conversation  only  by 
courtesy,  illustrates  a  deep-seated  human  tendency. 
Such  folk  seem  to  prefer  to  pass  an  evening  in  that 
fashion,  rather  than  to  be  alone  or  to  commune  with 
Nature,  or  to  read  a  good  book.  "  Anybody  for  com- 
pany "  appears  to  be  their  motto.  They  have  a  fairly 
pathetic  desire  to  get  with  their  kind,  if  only  to  feel 
the  warmth  of  human  contact  and  to  escape  from 
their  own  vacuity. 

The  instinct  for  getting  together  is  of  immense 
value  and  makes  modern  society,  in  the  broad  sense, 
the  significant  phenomenon  it  is.  This  is  altogether 
desirable,  and,  rightly  applied,  means  cooperation,  the 
union  that  is  strength.  It  fortifies  the  aims  and  ideals' 
of  the  individual  so  as  to  help  in  self-development 
and  alleviate  the  loneliness  which  otherwise  might 
lay  a  chill  hand  on  personal  endeavor  and  paralyze 
worthy  action. 

Even  when  we  are  enjoying  our  own  society  in- 
tensely, we  have  the  feeling  so  felicitously  described 
153 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 

by  Stevenson  in  the  inimitable  "  Travels  with  a 
Donkey."  Camping  out  at  night  in  the  pine  woods 
of  France  and  reveling  in  the  beauties  of  the  moonlit 
scene,  he  suddenly  wished  for  a  dear  companion  to 
share  it  with  him.  "  And  to  live  out-of-doors  with 
the  woman  one  loves  is,  of  all  lives,  the  most  complete 
and  free,"  he  declares. 

The  extension  in  our  time  of  the  associative  principle 
has  given  us  labor  unions  on  the  one  hand,  and  trusts 
on  the  other,  with  all  the  good  —  we  are  not  for  the 
moment  concerned  with  the  bad  —  to  be  connoted 
by  these  names.  The  vague  wish  to  touch  elbows 
with  other  mortals,  whether  in  some  vacation  idling,  at 
the  club,  playhouse,  political  meeting,  synagogue  or 
market  place,  can  be  relied  on  to  be  an  element  when- 
ever or  wherever  men  and  women  meet.  Deprive 
some  one  of  this  opportunity  to  forgather  and  swap  the 
news,  and  you  see  at  once  what  an  exaggerated,  even 
hectic,  influence  a  mere  footprint  in  the  sand  becomes. 
The  history  of  the  world  is  changed  by  the  stimulus 
to  human  thoughts  and  deeds  due  to  this  get-together 
instinct. 

At  the  same  time  it  can  be  abused,  this  associative 
desire,  and  the  ease  with  which  in  these  latter  days  one 
can  escape  from  oneself  may  breed  a  kind  of  person 
whose  individuality  is  ironed  out  into  a  pat  con- 
formity with  custom  and  convention.  Such  a  person 
hardly  knows  himself  in  any  true  sense. 

He  takes  his  thought,  language,  dress,  deportment 
154 


Ube  Hn&ivi&ual  an&  Society 

and  general  social  conduct  from  the  common  center 
which  seems  to  be  the  pooled  result  of  social  stimula- 
tion and  attrition.  Beyond  the  discussion  of  the 
weather,  every  word  that  issues  from  his  mouth  is 
second  hand,  and  an  act  independent  of  social  ap- 
proval would  be  as  objectionable  as  a  surgical  opera- 
tion. The  new  terrifies,  as  such;  the  old,  similarly, 
is  valid  in  his  eyes,  not  because  of  its  Tightness  but 
because  of  its  ancientness. 

There  can  be  no  question  that  a  certain  cast  of  mind 
is  peculiarly  prone  to  look  at  the  world  in  this  way, 
and  is  more  than  a  product  of  environment,  for  the 
hen-minded  personality  doubtless  antedates  society  it- 
self and  has  a  place,  sane  if  obscure,  in  the  large  pur- 
poses of  creation.  The  penalty  man  pays  for  the 
privileges  of  the  social  —  and  how  many  and  dear  they 
are !  —  is  the  loss  of  the  outstanding  personality,  the 
occasional  meteor  that  flits  by  erratically  among  the 
ordered,  calculable  courses  of  the  other  stars.  Per- 
haps the  price  may  not  be  too  high  when  the  benefits 
are  considered:  all  the  difference  between  the  primitive 
state  of  Nature  and  the  complex  and  impressive  spec- 
tacle of  a  modern  society. 

But  it  is  true  as  well  that  we  need  the  individual- 
istic, and  one  of  the  dangers  of  the  day  is  such  a  rub- 
bing down  of  the  qualities  natural  to  a  man  in  the 
fierce  attrition  of  life  as  shall  take  from  him  his 
salient  traits,  the  things  that  make  him  distinctive. 
Occasionally,  still,  you  meet  a  person  whom  you  de- 
155 


Xittlc  lEssags  in  Xiterature  an&  Xife 

clare  to  be  a  "  character,"  a  man  "  with  the  bark 
on,"  in  Frederick  Remington's  piquant  phrase. 

What  do  you  mean  in  so  designating  him?  Simply 
that  such  a  person  is  not  like  everybody  else,  as  most 
of  us  are:  dares  to  pursue  his  idiosyncrasies,  to  be  him- 
self even  if  so  doing  runs  counter  to  the  prevalent 
mode.  How  many  of  us,  for  example,  fellow-men, 
really  have  the  social  courage  to  wear  a  collar  or  a 
necktie  that  is  distinctly  out  of  date,  though  it  cost 
quite  enough  and  is  in  an  excellent  state  of  preserva- 
tion? Or  how  many  women  have  sufficient  in- 
dividuality to  adopt  a  coiffure  really  becoming  to  the 
shape  of  their  heads,  in  spite  of  the  current  fashion 
which  caricatures  beauty? 

The  matter  of  small  talk  offers  a  specially  apt  illus- 
tration. Few  indeed  are  those  who,  on  meeting  an- 
other human  being  for  the  first  time,  have  the  back- 
bone to  dodge  the  stereotyped  bromidic  observations 
about  the  weather  in  order  to  get  at  something  worth 
while!  This  usual  beginning  seems  as  inevitable  as 
the  portico  to  a  Greek  temple.  But  the  man  I  am 
thinking  of  does  not  conform  in  these  matters,  sees 
no  reason  why  he  should,  does  not  allow  himself  to 
be  drawn  into  the  silly,  sheeplike  imitations  which 
obsess  the  majority  of  earth's  inhabitants.  He  is 
frank,  direct,  simple.  If  he  makes  a  social  faux  pas, 
it  does  not  worry  him  and,  as  like  as  not,  he  is  not 
aware  of  it.  There  is  a  refreshing  unconventionality 
in  his  speech  and  garb ;  instead  of  waiting  to  note  what 

156 


ZTbe  1FnM\>ifcual  an&  Society 

others  may  do  in  a  given  case,  he  acts  on  his  own,  as 
the  English  say,  and  he  possesses  a  sort  of  innate 
dignity  that  saves  him  from  being  ridiculous,  and 
commands  our  respect. 

It  is  one  of  the  great  lessons  of  life  to  learn  to 
strike  a  happy  mean  between  these  two  extremes:  to 
preserve  one's  individuality,  yet  get  the  good  that  is  to  be 
found  in  the  social  relations  with  our  fellows,  with- 
out posing  as  an  eccentric  or  losing  identity  in  the 
crowd.  The  danger  of  the  former  is  obvious  and 
therefore  less  yielded  to  than  is  the  temptation  to 
merge  personality  in  a  constant  mingling  with  others. 
For  the  fullest  and  freest  expression  of  oneself,  the 
conformity  should  be  external  more  than  internal. 
Our  manners  should  be  those  of  polite  society,  but  our 
opinions  our  own;  to  reverse  this,  and  make  our  man- 
ners our  own  and  our  opinions  those  of  others,  is  to  be 
an  empty-headed  boor.  Our  age  is  commonly  called 
an  individualistic  one,  and  certainly  there  is  much  in 
its  literature  and  art  to  give  plausibility  to  the  idea. 
But  that  is  only  one  aspect  of  so  complex  a  time. 
Just  as  truly,  ours  is  a  social  age  and  it  is  safe  to  say 
that  never  has  there  been  a  stronger  pressure  upon 
the  individual  to  make  him  a  part  of  that  social 
solidity  which  means  civilization.  One  who  is  wise 
will  thus  cherish  his  ego,  yet  remember  that  he  who 
loseth  his  life  shall  find  it. 


157 


Hrt  ant)  Xetters 


Gbe  Iboiiness  of  Beauty 

r\AVID  bids  us  worship  the  Lord  in  the  beauty 
*-^  of  holiness.  The  lovely  words  are  vibrant  in 
our  ears,  for  all  the  world  loves  the  good,  though  it 
may  not  follow  it ;  and  this  is  as  true  of  "  the  po'  lost 
sheep  of  the  sheepfol'  "  as  it  is  of  the  saints  of  the 
synagogue.  Crooks  and  thugs,  harlots  and  thieves 
pay  tribute  in  their  very  vocabulary  to  virtue  as  the 
supreme,  beautiful,  and  desirable  thing:  they  speak  of 
"  a  straight  man,"  "  a  square  man  " ;  they  say  "  he  's 
on  the  level."  We  hear  of  honor  among  thieves;  the 
hypocrisy  of  a  Pecksniff  is  his  acknowledgment  of  the 
ineffable  worth  of  the  Good.  This  splendid  passage 
from  The  Wisdom  of  Solomon  sums  up  the  feeling: 
"  For  in  the  memory  of  virtue  is  immortality;  because 
it  is  recognized  both  before  God  and  before  man ; 
when  it  is  present  men  imitate  it,  and  they  long  after 
it  when  it  is  departed;  and  throughout  all  time  it 
marcheth  crowned  in  triumph,  victorious  in  the  strife 
for  the  prizes  that  are  undefiled." 

Equally  true  with  the  beauty  of  holiness  is  the  holi- 
ness of  beauty.     Sidney  Lanier  in  our  own  time  gave 
eloquent  expression  to  the  thought  which  is  a  return 
to  the  teaching  of  Ruskin  and  Emerson   and   Plato. 
161 


3Ltttie  Bssaps  in  ^Literature  anfc  %ife 


Here  are  Lanier's  words  :  "  Let  any  sculptor  hew  us 
out  the  most  ravishing  combination  of  tender  curve 
and  spheric  softness  that  ever  stood  for  woman;  yet 
if  the  lip  have  a  certain  fullness  that  hints  of  the 
flesh,  if  the  brow  be  insincere,  if  in  the  minutest  par- 
ticular the  physical  beauty  suggests  a  moral  ugliness, 
that  sculptor,  unless  he  be  portraying  a  moral  ugliness 
for  a  moral  purpose,  may  as  well  give  over  his  marble 
for  paving-stones.  Time,  whose  judgments  are  in- 
exorably moral,  will  not  accept  his  work.  For,  in- 
deed, we  may  say  that  he  who  has  not  yet  perceived 
how  artistic  beauty  and  moral  beauty  are  convergent 
lines  which  run  back  into  a  common  ideal  origin,  and 
who  therefore  is  not  afire  with  moral  beauty  just  as 
with  artistic  beauty,  that  he,  in  short,  who  has  not 
come  to  that  stage  of  quiet  and  eternal  frenzy  in 
which  the  beauty  of  holiness  and  the  holiness  of  beauty 
mean  one  thing,  burn  as  one  fire,  shine  as  one  light 
within  him;  he  is  not  yet  the  great  artist." 

Every  sincere  literary  worker  feels  this,  and  in  his 
heart  of  hearts  has  a  religious  regard  and  respect  for 
what  he  would  do.  Our  finest  critic  of  poetry,  the 
late  E.  C.  Stedman,  says  that  the  idealist's  recogni- 
tion of  the  relations  of  beauty  and  truth  "  is  a  kind  of 
natural  piety,  and  renders  the  labor  of  the  poet  or 
other  artist  of  the  beautiful  a  proper  form  of  wor- 
ship." 

Yet  this  truth  has  been  largely  forgotten,  or  con- 
sciously set  aside  in  our  day.  As  literature  was  pro- 
162 


Ube  IboUness  of  Beauty 

duced,  became  self-conscious  and  developed  what  is 
called  criticism,  there  arose  a  theory  which  separated 
the  beauty  that  is  spiritual  from  that  which  is  artistic: 
in  other  words,  esthetic  beauty.  And  the  cleavage 
has  become  so  distinct  that  in  some  cases  we  mark 
the  complete  divorcement  of  those  sister-like  beauties 
which,  in  the  language  of  Tennyson,  "  never  can  be 
sundered  without  tears." 

The  esthete  declares  that  the  only  beauty  he  knows 
and  cares  about  is  that  of  form.  Whistler  vents  the 
remark  that  such  sentiments  as  love,  patriotism,  and 
religion  have  nothing  to  do  with  art,  which  is  a  mat- 
ter exclusively  of  form  and  color.  Oscar  Wilde,  as 
if  trying  to  show  the  principle  in  its  reductio  ad 
absurdum,  says  that  a  color-sense  is  more  important 
to  the  human  race  than  a  sense  of  right  and  wrong. 
And  Zola  declares  that  the  only  morality  he  as  a  writer 
recognizes  is  the  morality  of  the  fine  phrase.  These 
three  utterances,  from  three  men  of  genius  of  our 
day,  strikingly  illustrate  the  divorce  of  esthetics  and 
ethics.  But  surely  this  severance  is  unnatural.  And, 
as  surely,  it  has  done  harm.  For  what  is  beauty  in 
the  broad  sense?  Is  not  its  guiding  principle  sym- 
metry, harmony?  And  this  is  the  same  principle 
which  runs  not  alone  through  all  the  arts  and  litera- 
ture to  give  them  validity,  but  also  through  human  con- 
duct and  throughout  the  physical  universe. 

The  kiss  of  word  and  word,  which  we  call  rhyme 
in  poetry,  is  a  vocal  agreement  or  harmony;  the 

163 


Xtttle  Essays  in  Xtterature  a^  %ffe 

makeup  of  a  sonata  or  symphony  is  the  harmonious 
arrangement  of  parts;  and  what  the  painter  calls  his 
"  composition  "  is  the  same  thing, —  the  harmonious 
disposition  of  details  to  secure  a  pleasing  effect  of 
unity.  And  in  the  world  of  physical  fact  equally,  a 
sense  of  the  evolutionary  unity  of  life  thrills  us  with 
the  thought  of  the  majestic  harmony  of  agreement,  eon 
dovetailing  with  eon,  and  star  saluting  star  in  the 
great  rhythm  of  space  and  time.  Even  so  in  the  hu- 
man body,  the  systole  and  diastole  of  the  heart,  in 
tireless  iteration,  are  a  symbol  of  the  movement,  uni- 
versal and  everlasting,  which  is  in  all  things  and  makes 
life  possible.  It  is  because  of  the  verity  of  this  uni- 
versal principle  of  creation  that  it  is  no  mere  figure  of 
speech  to  speak  of  the  music  of  the  spheres.  Recall 
Shakspere's  description  of  music  in  "  The  Merchant 
of  Venice": 

There's  not  the  smallest  orb  which  thou  behold'st 
But  in  his  motion  like  an  angel  sings, 
Still  quiring  to  the  young-eyed  cherubims. 

It  is  time  for  the  recognition  of  the  essential  bond 
between  these  sisters,  divinely  derived  and  unhappily 
sundered,  whose  mighty  mission  to  the  world  is  prop- 
erly one,  as  the  poet  and  philosopher  never  tire  of 
telling.  We  should  reunite  the  members  of  the  family 
and  be  present  as  assisting  parties  at  the  reestablish- 
ment  of  a  kin-tie  after  foolish  estrangement.  Criticism 
and  commonsense  can  clasp  hands  here.  There  are 
signs  which  point  to  the  broader  conception  of  art 

164 


Ube  Doltness  of  JSeautp 

which  sees  that,  to  be  worthy,  it  must  express  the 
spirit,  the  soul  of  man,  as  well  as  his  sense  pleasures. 
Because  the  holiness  of  beauty  is  as  true  as  the 
beauty  of  holiness,  we  find  an  explanation  of  the  fact 
that  the  Bible,  apart  from  being  the  authoritative 
guide  for  conduct,  is  the  greatest  work  in  English 
literature;  and  this,  despite  the  other  fact  that  it  is  a 
collection  of  writings  out  of  three  foreign  tongues, 
Englished  for  us  in  incomparable  form  in  the  time  of 
the  first  Stuart  sovereign.  It  is  the  one  series  of  writ- 
ings gathered  into  a  volume  which  unites  with  a  match- 
less felicity  of  expression  a  steady  spiritual  purpose 
and  ideal ;  it  is  this  which  makes  it  unique,  since  no 
such  claim  can  be  set  up  for  Shakspere  or  any  other 
of  the  major  English  writers, —  even  for  Milton,  lofty 
and  pure  as  he  is.  The  Bible  is  an  object-lesson  for 
the  idea  that  the  beauty  of  holiness  and  the  holiness  of 
beauty  are  but  phases  of  one  cosmic  principle.  And 
with  the  advantage  given  us  by  this  clearer,  broader 
realization  of  the  significance  of  the  Book  of  Books, 
we  are  studying  and  enjoying  it  with  more  fruitful 
results  than  ever  before;  seeing  it  as  a  Book  of  power 
and  beauty  as  well  as  truth,  recognizing  that  none  of 
these  attributes  is  contradictory  of  the  other. 


165 


an&  Seeh  wttb  TRomance 

GEORGE  MOORE,  in  one  of  those  intimate  mo- 
ments when  he  reveals  himself  as  an  acute  and 
most  suggestive  essayist,  declares  that  he  feels  ac- 
cording to  his  temperament  but  acts  according  to  his 
looks.  Those  who  know  his  physiognomy  will  get 
the  full  force  of  his  remark. 

How  true  it  is  that  we  hide  our  burning  romanti- 
cism under  a  deadly  cloak  of  convention !  Ashamed  of 
the  poetry  in  us,  we  talk  prose,  look  it,  dress  it.  The 
New  Englander's  understatement,  the  canny  Scotch- 
man's caution,  the  matter-of-factness  of  the  Philistine, 
are,  I  believe,  the  mere  hiding  of  the  romance  that  is 
in  us  all.  George  Moore  is  known  to  the  world  as 
the  sternest,  most  uncompromising  of  realists;  and, 
in  the  expressive  idiom  of  the  day,  he  looks  the  part. 
But  touches  there  are  in  his  fiction  and  essays  which  re- 
veal another  G.  M., —  the  Moore  who  is  perhaps  the 
deepest  expression  of  his  personality:  the  shy  poet, 
masking  behind  the  purveyor  of  crass  reality. 

In  the  same  way  that  arch  iconoclast,  Bernard  Shaw, 
has  flashes  of  poetry  in  his  plays  that  are  all  the  more 
startling  because  they  come  from  the  author  of  "  Mrs. 
Warren's  Profession." 

1 66 


an&  Seefe  witb  IRomance 

Yes,  and  we  all  play  hide  and  seek  with  romance, 
the  elusive,  shy,  fawnlike  thing  that  is  yet  never  far 
away,  easily  sought,  and  loved,  though  in  secret,  of 
us  all.  It  is  a  strange  characteristic  of  man  that  he 
is  so  prone  to  disavow  this  tendency  in  himself:  cover- 
ing up  his  sense  of  poetry  with  the  commonplace,  and 
always  denying,  with  a  Peter-like  repetition,  the  de- 
sire for  beauty  that  is  so  inextricably  interwoven  with 
the  warp  and  woof  of  his  being. 

A  New  Englander  hates  to  call  a  lake  anything  but 
a  pond,  for  fear  he  will  be  caught  napping  as  a  suspect 
on  the  charge  of  sentimentality;  and  the  westerner,  in- 
stead of  waxing  rosy  in  speech  over  the  loveliness  of 
woman,  remarks  laconically  that  she  is  "  some  girl  " 
or  "  easy  to  look  at." 

To  explain  this  avoidance  of  ostensible  romance  on 
the  part  of  many  is  business  for  the  philosopher:  to 
recognize  it  is  but  to  gaze  at  the  human  show. 

The  joke  of  it  is,  that  if  you  will  only  watch  this 
same  practical  citizen,  you  shall  find  him  constantly 
doing  things  in  a  kind  of  shamefaced  way,  which 
plainly  announces  his  liking  for  romance.  He  will, 
on  the  sly,  consume  hectic  fiction  that  grossly  violates 
the  sane  conventions,  reveling  in  battle,  murder  and 
sudden  death,  and  issue  refreshed  from  this  tonic  con- 
tact with  the  sensational,  Stevenson's  "  penny  dreadful 
and  twopence  colored."  See  him  at  the  playhouse  and 
observe  how  he  will  patronize  the  crude  melodramas, 
and  insure  long  runs  for  them,  under  the  same  secret 

167 


Xittie  JBssa^s  in  literature  anfc  Xife 

urge  of  poetry,  romance,  the  imaginative  exhibition  of 
the  world's  more  exciting  aspects.  Nor  have  we  no- 
ticed that  in  the  even  tenor  of  business  such  folk  re- 
frain from  plunging  and  chance-taking,  which  increases 
the  tempo  of  the  game;  while  in  a  motor-car  they 
prefer  on  general  principles  to  exceed  the  speed  limit, 
adding  thus  a  dare-devil  touch  to  the  experience,  when 
there  is  no  hurry  at  all. 

Perhaps  romance  would  not  be  true  to  its  name  if 
it  did  not  dodge  in  and  out  of  our  lives  in  this  way, 
and  were  not  wooed  inconstantly  and  without  formal 
acknowledgment  on  our  part.  It  may  be  that  its 
innocent  illicitness  is  a  factor  in  its  charm.  George 
Moore,  no  doubt,  wishes  he  were  as  romantic  as  he 
feels;  and  the  romantic  feeling  may  be  all  the  stronger 
in  his  breast  for  the  very  reason  that  the  world  at 
large  does  not  suspect  it,  and  credits  him,  indeed,  with 
another  view.  Stevenson,  in  that  charming  essay  of 
his,  "  Lantern  Bearers,"  tells  how  he  and  other 
Scotch  lads,  on  the  windy  links  o'  nights,  hid  the 
lanterns  under  their  jackets  and  only  revealed  mo- 
mentarily a  flash  to.  a  passing  comrade,  as  a  shibboleth 
and  shining  symbol  of  brotherhood.  The  boys  rep- 
resented mankind  and  the  lantern  was  the  quenchless 
note  of  romance.  They  were  playing  hide  and  seek 
with  it  there  by  the  sounding  sea,  as  we  all  are  beside 
the  sea  of  life,  whose  everlasting  cadences  whisper  of 
the  higher  destiny  and  the  undying  hope. 

The  suspicion  of  romance,  or  the  attempt  to  dis- 
168 


Dtfce  an&  Seefc  wttb  IRomance 

claim  it  on  the  part  of  the  millions  who  really  are 
eager  for  it,  arises  from  its  abuse:  from  the  many 
false  and  silly  things  associated  with  it  and  the  foolish 
excesses  committed  in  its  fair  name.  Romance,  prop- 
erly, is  not  sentimentality  nor  pose  nor  affectation  of 
any  sort;  it  does  not  mean  extravagance  in  speech, 
dress  or  behavior,  nor  is  it  the  enemy  of  common- 
sense. 

It  is  rather  the  wish,  or,  better,  the  instinct  for  the 
livelier  and  lovelier  manifestations  of  life  in  contrast 
with  the  dead-and-alive  and  drab-hued  nothing-doing 
which  at  times  seems  to  descend  upon  us  like  a  fog, 
squelching  zeal,  paralyzing  action,  and  putting  a 
quietus  upon  joy. 

We  all  meet  these  desert  places  upon  the  journey, 
and  when  the  oasis  is  glimpsed,  how  welcome  its  green 
glint  and  the  pro  nise  of  shade  beside  the  cool  water! 
Even  if  it  turn  out  a  mirage,  many  would  prefer  to 
have  that  instead  of  the  ceaseless  stretch  of  sand; 
and  so  they  seize  on  pleasant  lies  in  art  and  literature 
and  the  theater.  But  this  is  foolish,  because  the  price 
you  pay  is  too  big:  disillusion  when  the  mirage  fades 
and  the  desert  march  becomes  the  more  intolerable. 
But  this  explains  how  fervently  the  false  substitutes 
for  romance, —  the  pseudo-art  of  every  kind, —  are 
grasped  as  one  grasps  a  friend's  hand,  though  it  prove 
a  foe's. 

Let  us  at  least  remember  how  universal  is  the  ro- 
mantic appeal  (whatever  form4  it  take),  and  not 
169 


Xtttle  Essags  in  ^Literature  atto  SLife 

despise  any  honest  movement  toward  it.  The  fakirs 
who  use  it  to  their  own  advantage  should  be  sternly 
handled,  but  their  sins  never  charged  up  to  that  which 
they  are  discrediting.  Even  as  breathing  is  an  in- 
stinctive art  of  physical  self-preservation,  so  is  the 
aspiration  (note  the  etymology  which  signifies  breath) 
toward  beauty  an  instinct  for  psychic  self-preservation, 
and  the  two  are  equally  legitimate. 

The  person  who  does  not  breathe  deeper  in  the 
presence  of  romance  is  in  danger  of  a  spiritual  smother- 
ing and  should  forthwith  begin  to  doctor  the  lungs 
of  his  soul.  If  not  a  steady,  open  commerce  with  so 
dear  an  experience,  then  let  it  be  hide  and  seek.  Nor 
should  we  play  the  game  half-heartedly,  but  lustily, 
for  all  it  and  we  are  worth.  For,  curiously,  the  re- 
sponse will  be  swift  and  sure.  Others  who  dare  not, 
timid  souls  that  they  are,  will  applaud  the  more  ad- 
venturous; in  other  words,  will  buy  your  pictures  or 
books,  listen  to  your  music,  attend  your  plays,  swear 
by  you  as  a  man  and  a  brother.  He  who  makes  ro- 
mance can  count  upon  a  following.  He  is  doing  our 
work  for  us,  vicariously,  and  we  are  willing  to  pay 
the  price.  A  kind  of  virtue  issues  from  his  very 
presence. 


170 


Hn  ©lt>  2>ictionan>:  H  IRevcr? 

WHAT  more  jejune  for  the  subject  of  a  revery! 
And  yet  it  appeals  clamorously  to  my  sentiment, 
and  you,  dear  reader,  shall  know  why,  and  be  the 
arbiter  of  my  mood. 

Imprimis,  't  is  a  copy  of  John  Walker's  Pro- 
nouncing Dictionary, —  and  there  is  magic  for  me 
in  the  very  name:  on  t  ic  face  of  it,  I  grant  you,  al- 
most as  unpoetic  as  Smith,  or  Brown  or  Robinson  of 
humdrum  connotation.  But  softly!  Do  you  remem- 
ber the  delightful  scene  in  Dickens'  Christmas  Carol, 
where  dear  old  Scrooge,  metamorphosed  by  the  kindly 
coming  of  the  ghosts,  pokes  his  time-worn  poll  out  of 
the  window  on  Christmas  morning  and  inquires  of  a 
street  urchin  if  he  knows  the  whereabouts  of  a  certain 
poulterer's;  and  upon  getting  an  affirmative,  bids  the 
boy  cut  away  and  buy  a  turkey  that  shall  take  the 
town  with  wonder  for  its  size;  and  how  the  gamin 
emits  the  one  word  of  rapturous  agnostic  wonder: 
"Walker!" 

I  recall  how  as  a  boy  myself  —  was  it  longer  ago 
than  yesterday  ?  —  I  reveled  in  this  full-mouthed,  sug- 
gestive exclamation.  I  had  no  notion  of  what  it 
meant,  but  it  was  deeply  satisfying.  And  not  all  my 
171 


Oltttie  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xtte 


commerce  with  dictionaries  since,  has  quite  dulled  the 
romance  that  is  forever  associated  in  my  mind  with 
that  moment  of  the  imagination,  that  irreverent  in- 
vocation of  an  august  lexicographer!  It  illuminated 
the  need  of  literature  in  a  hard  world  of  fact ;  it  justi- 
fies John  Walker's  existence.  The  knowledge,  later 
acquired,  that  Walker's  was  at  the  time  a  name  to 
conjure  with  in  the  ways  of  scholarship,  has  its  main 
use  in  the  light  it  throws  upon  this  scene  out  of 
Dickens,  mighty  master  of  life. 

The  date  of  my  copy  is  1833;  tne  publishers,  Scott 
&  Webster  (successors  to  Mr.  Dove, —  fancy  a  book- 
man of  the  delectable  name  of  Dove!),  36  Charter 
House  Square,  London.  Dear  me,  Charter  House 
Square!  At  once  I  am  off  on  a  tangent, —  one  of 
those  criss-cross  paths  of  the  imagination  which  some- 
how allure  me  more  than  the  straight  and  proper 
thoroughfares  of  thought  —  my  mind  full  of  the  sing- 
ing memories  of  sundry  Charter  House  schoolboys: 
Lovelace  and  Addison,  and  Steele  (dear  Dick!),  and 
Thackeray  and  John  Wesley — Heavens,  what  a 
crew!  Publishers  who  dwell  in  Charter  House 
Square  should  think  twice  ere  they  put  their  imprint 
upon  an  avowedly  dry-as-dust  volume  like  a  dictionary ; 
't  is  provocative  of  dreams,  not  etymologies. 

The   manner   of   title   of   the  book   has   a   certain 

pathos ;   I   find   myself  sentimental   over   it.     'T  is   so 

perilously    long.     That    comfortable    stagecoach    time 

(the  iron  horse  had  not  yet  begun  to  snort  and  cavort 

172 


Hn  ®lb  Dictionary :  H  1Rex>en> 

up  and  down  the  land)  was  not  unwilling  to  read  its 
titles  long  instead  of  clear :  "  A  Critical  Pronouncing 
Dictionary  and  Expositor  of  the  English  Language, 
in  which  not  only  the  meaning  of  every  word  is 
clearly  explained,  and  the  sound " —  but  no,  gentle 
reader,  'twill  not  do;  'tis  a  little  essay  in  itself,  and 
mine  must  be  nothing  more.  Suffice  it  for  you  to 
know  that  there  are  just  two  hundred  and  seventy-one 
words  in  this  entitular  address,  as  it  befits  to  call  it. 
I  may  add  here  that  the  book  is  bound  in  plain  gray- 
brown  boards,  with  a  green  back  and  white  slip  cover, 
a  very  pleasant  unobtrusive  dress ;  and  is,  though  some- 
what battered  without,  interiorly  in  wondrous  good 
condition,  handled,  I  dare  avouch,  in  its  earlier  days, 
by  one  gentle  born,  whose  hands  touched  even  a  dic- 
tionary with  cleanly  respect  and  due  courtesy.  Which 
leads  me  to  name  another  cause  for  sentiment.  The 
fly  leaf  of  the  volume  (which  I  acquired  second-hand, 
—  the  sympathetic  reader  my  have  deduced  so  much) 
bears  the  inscription :  "  Deborah  Thidd,  3rd  month, 
1834."  Lovely  name  and  lovely  thought, —  a 
woman,  a  vestal  and  a  Quaker!  The  cup  of  my  joy 
here  spills  over.  There  is  no  one  else  in  all  the  gen- 
eration past  I  should  prefer  as  joint-owner  of  the 
precious  volume.  (Observe,  reader,  that  I  do  not 
say  former  owner;  nay,  that  were  formal,  most  un- 
friendly to  the  winsome  shade  of  Deborah,  whom  I 
love  in  all  respect  and  tenderness.)  Does  any  hold 
that  Thidd  is  a  name  uneuphonious,  unideal  ?  To  him 
173 


Xtttle  Essays  in  Xtterature  anfc  Xtfe 

I  simply  say :  "  Good  sir,  you  make  the  woeful  error 
to  detach  the  Thidd  from  that  dear,  quaint  old  appella- 
tion of  Deborah,  with  all  its  captivating  associations 
of  militant  righteousness  and  Puritan  fair-maidenhood. 
Taken  together,  Deborah  Thidd  is  adorable;  even 
conceding  that  Thidd  alone  gives  one  pause.  Mat- 
thew Arnold,  you  will  remember,  hurls  the  arrow  of 
his  winged  satire  at  a  certain  wretched  female  yclept 
Wragg.  True,  't  is  a  horrid  thing ;  but  its  horror 
inheres  in  the  absence  of  any  sex-revealing  and  soften- 
ing baptismal  name  as  prefix  to  Wragg.  Her  pen- 
chant for  crime  (if  memory  serves,  she  killed  her 
child)  seeks  an  explanation  no  further  afield. 

As  I  lingeringly  turn  over  the  pages  of  my  time- 
stained  Walker,  I  hold  a  sort  of  spiritual  communion 
with  the  fair  Deborah;  for  fair  she  was,  reader,  I  am 
forever  convinced.  I  have  sought  eagerly  yet  pa- 
tiently through  its  double  rows  of  words  (there  are 
nigh  six  hundred  pages)  for  some  mark,  some  com- 
ment, some  memorandum  or  marginal  token  of  use; 
but  alas,  none  sullies  the  volume's  virginal  white. 
'T  would  have  been  (for  me)  a  dramatic  event  in  the 
calendar  of  sentiment  had  any  such  been  found.  I 
should  have  deemed  it  a  personal  communication  from 
Deborah,  almost  a  love  letter.  But  it  consoles  me  to 
reflect  that  'twas  not  in  consonance  with  her  nice 
Quaker  way  to  smirch  or  deface  a  book,  even  by  the 
fine  delicate  lines  her  high-bred  hand  would  in- 
dubitably have  traced  upon  its  surface.  I  have  some- 
174 


Hn  ©10  Dictionary :  H  1Re\>erp 

times  wondered  that  Charles  Lamb,  with  his  familiar 
liking  for  the  Quakers,  should  have  had  that  incor- 
rigible habit  of  side-lining  and  commentarizing  in  his 
beloved  quartos;  but  then,  he  loved  books  even  be- 
yond Quakers;  yea,  I  doubt  not,  beyond  that  fair- 
haired  Quakeress  immortalized  as  Hester.  Perhaps 
it  had  been  otherwise,  had  he  known  my  Deborah. 

Did  you  note  that  Deborah  acquired  the  volume 
in  the  third  month,  in  March?  That  month  of  hurly- 
burly,  of  bluster,  bleakness  and  blow,  has  little  of 
magic  association  for  us  Americans.  But  the  English 
March  is  like  our  April,  a  season  of  mild  skies,  green- 
ing buds,  and  a  wild  hint  of  coming  flowers.  So  that 
in  imagination  I  see  my  dear  Quakeress  walking  across 
spring  fields  (she  did  not  set  down  her  habitat  in  the 
book,  hence  my  assumption  of  a  country  residence,  or 
at  least,  a  suburban,  is  altogether  justified)  ;  the  dic- 
tionary, neatly  done  up  in  blue-gray  paper,  tucked 
primly  under  arm.  To  look  at  it  and  her,  you  would 
have  believed  (with  the  March  odors  in  your  nostrils, 
mind  you)  that  'twas  a  book  of  lyrics, —  Keats  or 
Shelley,  may  be, —  young  men  but  recently  perished 
in  their  prime.  Or, —  ah,  it  is  a  thought  haply  con- 
gruous with  my  vision  of  Deborah, —  it  might  be 
taken  for  a  copy  of  the  Essays  of  Ella,  purchased  the 
very  year  of  his  death,  1834,  the  date  when  Deborah 
writ  her  name  in  Walker  and  made  herself  known 
to  me,  and  through  me,  I  trust,  to  a  few  others. 
But  no,  in  the  very  teeth  of  vernal  invitation,  she 
175 


Xittle  Essays  In  literature  anb  OLtte 

wends  homeward  in  the  company  not  of  the  elect  of 
literature,  but  of  one  Walker,  grave  purveyor  of  verbs 
and  nouns,  and  suchlike  remnants  of  learning.  Surely, 
it  becomes  plain  our  Deborah  was  fain  to  be  nice  in 
her  speech  uses  and  would  make  no  slip  in  spelling, 
even  in  the  fervor  of  Love's  most  compulsive  epistles; 
hence  her  burden  of  dictionary,  that  far-away  but  still 
fragrant  morn  of  March. 

J.  Walker,  albeit  a  good  scholar,  paid  the  penalty 
all  scholarship  must  render  Time:  his  tome  (worthy 
monument  of  his  day)  is  long  since  superseded.  For 
my  daily  work  I  must  turn  to  other  men.  But  he 
stands  on  my  shelf  within  hand-reach,  an  honored 
guest,  a  tried  friend.  I  love  to  have  him  hard  by.  If 
he  satisfies  not  my  head,  he  does  my  heart,  and  that 
after  all  is  more  important.  What  is  knowledge 
compared  with  the  undertow  of  the  emotions?  He 
comes  like  a  faint  sweet  breath  out  of  the  dusty  past, 
and  brings,  like  a  bit  of  arbutus  from  the  spring 
woods,  a  thought  of  my  co-heir  forever  in  his  outworn 
wisdom,  the  unknown,  the  treasured  Quaker, —  even 
Deborah  Thidd! 


176 


Beauty  an&  Sorrow 

'T  DO  not  wish  to  see  it  or  hear  it,  it  is  so  sad; 
<*•  there  is  enough  sadness  in  life,  without  re- 
producing it  in  art  and  literature," — how  often  one 
hears  the  protest.  And  how  true  it  would  be,  if  the 
arts  did  naught  else  but  repeat  the  misery,  reminding 
man  of  his  inevitable  unhappiness,  just  when  he  would 
turn  away  from  reality  to  art,  in  order  to  forget  it 
for  the  nonce.  But  that  is  not  what  true  art  does 
or  ever  has  done.  It  seizes  on  the  sorrow  which  is 
in  life,  mitigates  it,  explains  it,  makes  it,  like  the 
one  discordant  note  in  concerted  music,  to  blend  with 
all  the  instruments  into  a  total  and  richer  har- 
mony. 

The  truth  is  that  in  art,  if  you  make  sorrow  beauti- 
ful, you  offer  consolation.  Edward  Fitzgerald  had  a 
sense  of  this  when  he  wrote  to  a  friend  concerning  his 
as  yet  unpublished  translation  of  Omar  Khayyam: 
"It  is  a  desperate  sort  of  thing,  unfortunately  at  the 
bottom  of  most  thinking  men's  minds;  and  made 
music  of."  As  who  should  say,  the  music  justifies  it. 
So  Dante,  too,  in  his  telling  to  Virgil  of  the  loves  of 
Paolo  and  Francesca,  that  twain  as  piteous  as  the 
other  twain,  Romeo  and  Juliet,  speaks  of  their  love 
177 


Xtttie  Essays  in  literature  a^  Xite 

time  as  the  time  of  the  beautiful  sighings;  how  the 
Italian  draws  out  the  thought  and  caresses  it, 

Al  tempo  de'  dolci  sospiri, 

—  and   Wordsworth   signifies   his   recognition   of   the 
law  that  the  sweetest  has  inevitably  a  flavor  of  melan- 
choly in  writing  the  familiar  words: 

In  that  sweet  mood  when  pleasant  thoughts 
Bring  sad  thoughts  to  the  mind; 

—  while  Keats,  the  beloved,  high  priest  of  Beauty,  if 
one  such  there  be  in  English  song,  knowing  well  that 
if  you  but  make  sorrow  beautiful  and  set  it  to  music, 
you  pluck  out  its  sting,  cries: 

Ay,  in  the  very  temple  of  delight 

Veiled  melancholy  has  her  sovran  shrine. 

And  so,  once  more,  the  beauty  that  is  in  great  trag- 
edy is  to  be  explained  by  its  harmonious  relation  to 
spiritual  experience.  If  the  pain  which  comes  from 
our  perception  of  the  dissonance  between  life  as  we 
know  it  and  life  as  we  might  imagine  it  to  be,  plucked 
of  the  pain,  be  only  mitigated  by  a  feeling  that  in  the 
fleeting  vision  lies  promise  of  ultimate  good  when 
"  God  shall  wipe  away  all  tears  from  their  eyes," 
then  the  sorrow  becomes  sweet  indeed.  Hence  the 
thoughtful  suggestiveness  of  the  definition  of  beauty 
as  "  a  promise  of  happiness." 

And  so  it  is  in  life,  even  as  in  the  great  literature 
which  reflects  life.  My  friend  writes  me  but  yester- 

178 


Beauts  an&  Sorrow 

day  of  facing  her  first  Christmas  with  the  beloved 
gone;  it  was  an  unspeakable  sorrow,  says  she,  but  not 
too  great,  for  it  was  "  a  sweet  sorrow."  What  an 
acknowledgment,  this,  that  life  was  widened,  enriched, 
solemnized,  and  transfigured  by  Love's  deepening 
through  the  loss  of  the  loved  one ! 

There  is  a  deep  instinct,  after  all,  behind  and  un- 
der the  demand  for  a  so-called  "  happy  ending "  to 
play,  story  or  poem,  in  the  literature  which  depicts 
life.  Not  because  of  the  desire,  merchant-wise,  to 
supply  an  unthinking  request  for  pleasure  at  the  ex- 
pense of  all  truth  for  the  symmetrical  verisimilitude  of 
sound  art;  but  rather  because  the  human  mind 
naturally  reaches  out  to  the  end,  through  intervening 
discouragements,  as  hope  sees  beyond  the  storm  clouds 
of  a  wild  day  the  ineffable  soft  dove  colors  of  sunset 
and  afterglow.  The  mind  needs,  and  hence  demands, 
that  final  compensation  to  balance  the  composition 
and  read  the  riddle  plain.  A  quatrain  from  the  old 
German  lyrist,  Giinther,  is  a  hope,  and  more  than  a 
hope, —  a  prescient  belief  that  bespeaks  him  no  less 
man  than  poet: 

Der  Anfang  unser  reine  Liebe 
1st  Unruh,  Ungliick,  Hohn  und  Pein ; 
Das  Mittel  1st  nicht  mindre  Triibe; 
Doch  soil  das  Ende  lustig  sein. 

Ah,  till  the  end  of  all  Time  toil-worn  and  pain- 
riven  mortals  will  murmur  those  words,  "  Yet  shall 
the  ending  happy  be,"  and  find  in  the  utterance  a  com- 
179 


Xittle  Bssa^s  In  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 

fort  that  transcends  all  the  process  of  ratiocination. 

This  mission  of  art  to  make  sorrow  beautiful  and  ex- 
plicable, perhaps  the  highest  service  it  can  perform  for 
mankind  since  sorrow  is  of  the  very  texture  of  life,  is 
the  sufficient  answer  to  the  intellectual  babes-in-arms 
who  cry  out  for  only  what  they  are  pleased  to  call  the 
"  pleasant "  in  literature,  and  shrink  from  ^schylus, 
Shakspere,  Balzac,  and  Ibsen  when  they  would  grapple 
with  our  souls,  purging  them,  in  the  Aristotelian  sense, 
of  the  dross  and  purifying  them  through  the  exercise 
of  pity  and  terror.  But  often  this  noble  and  hence 
legitimate  use  of  the  sad  is  changed  to  an  exhibition  of 
the  dark  and  dreary  aspects  of  mankind  and  the  lives 
they  live,  because  of  the  sensational  nature  of  the  ap- 
peal; or  as  expressive  of  a  mood  of  pessimism  and  re- 
volt; sometimes,  it  would  seem,  merely  for  misery's 
sake.  All  sane-minded  persons  are  right  in  the  instinct 
to  turn  from  this  and  to  protest  against  it.  In  inten- 
tion and  effect,  it  is  no  more  like  the  other  high  and 
holy  handling  of  life's  disharmonies  than  a  sneak  thief 
is  like  Prometheus  filching  fire  from  heaven  to  give 
it  to  men  for  their  everlasting  weal. 

Moreover,  the  test  is  simple,  a  subjective  one  de- 
pending upon  the  effect  of  what  is  read  upon  the 
reader.  How  does  the  poem  or  drama  or  novel  leave 
you?  Calmed,  braced,  broadened,  solemnized, —  any 
or  all  of  these?  After  it,  is  there  a  clear  realization 
of  the  laws  that  govern  living  and  the  love  that  sweet- 
ens it?  Then  was  the  tragic  presentment  worth  while, 
1 80 


Beauts  anfc  Sorrow 

and  not  otherwise.  You  have  melted  "  into  an  ancient 
woe,"  nor  lost  your  time.  You  have  listened  to  ad- 
vantage to  "  The  still,  sad  music  of  humanity."  You 
have  been  made  to  realize  that  "  Evil  is  the  soul's 
misuse  of  means."  Sophocles'  "  OEdipus,"  Shakspere's 
"  Lear,"  Tolstoi's  "  Resurrection "  are  all  tragedies, 
delineations  of  human  suffering  and  human  wrong. 
But  they  are  alike  in  leaving  you  better  prepared  to 
play  your  part,  helped  in  the  homely  but  divine  busi- 
ness of  daily  living. 

The  trouble  with  much  modern  literature  of  the 
false-tragic  sort  is  not  only  that  it  lacks  hope,  but  also 
proportion  and  love.  It  is  disproportionate  in  its  em- 
phasis upon  a  part  of  the  picture,  instead  of  upon  the 
whole.  And  it  lacks  love  for  the  reason  that  the 
writer  is  not  sympathetically  implicated  in  the  fate 
of  his  characters,  but,  more  like  a  scientist  than  a 
literary  creator,  stands  coldly  aloof,  to  watch  the 
psychological  sequences  of  cause  and  effect.  Art  will 
never  be  science  till,  as  Kipling  has  it,  "  earth's  last 
picture  is  painted."  Nor  will  the  literature  which 
comes  out  of  life  be  fully  justified  until  it  gives  back 
to  life  an  interpretation  thereof  that  aids  man  to  be 
wise,  just,  loving  and  obedient. 


181 


©n  Being  "IRaturai" 

HOW  often  you  hear  the  remark  concerning  some 
distinguished  player,  "  Oh,  he  does  not  really 
act,  you  know ;  he  is  just  himself  on  the  stage !  "  The 
person  who  understands  the  technic  of  the  profession, 
and,  more  broadly,  has  given  thought  to  the  underlying 
principles  of  all  art,  will  secretly  smile  when  such 
opinion  is  vented.  For  he  is  well  aware  that  if  the 
actor  did  merely  reproduce  himself  as  he  is  off  the 
stage,  he  would  be  hopelessly  ineffective.  Players  like 
Maude  Adams,  Ethel  Barrymore,  John  Drew,  and 
William  Gillette,  who  seem,  in  the  parlance  of  the  day, 
to  be  giving  imitations  of  themselves,  and  nothing 
more,  are  as  likely  as  not  envisaging  character  and  de- 
parting, by  all  the  difference  between  art  and  life,  from 
what  would  be  their  private  personality.  It  is  true 
that  personality  shines  through  the  work;  and  in  this 
they  differ  from  the  so-called  character  actor  who  com- 
pletely merges  his  external  appearance  in  his  part, 
which  from  its  nature  allows  him  to  do  so. 

It  is  a  matter  of  fact  that  the  other's  problem  is 
a  harder  one:  in  spite  of  the  lack  of  disguise,  to  con- 
vey a  sense  of  fictive  character  and  to  denote  it  by 
other  more  hidden  means  than  that  of  makeup   and 
182 


<S>n  Eefna  "Natural" 


costume.  Partridge,  in  Fielding's  novel,  it  will  be 
recalled,  when  he  was  taken  to  the  theater  to  hear 
Garrick,  could  see  nothing  in  the  little  man  who  only 
did  what  anybody  would  do  under  the  circumstances. 
This  was  an  unconscious  tribute  to  the  great  English 
player. 

The  point  is  that  being  "  natural  "  on  the  stage  is 
being  artificial  in  a  way  to  simulate  life,  —  in  reality 
making  use  of  an  enlargement  of  life  which  is  totally 
different  from  life  itself.  Being  "  natural,"  in  other 
words,  is  seeming  natural,  a  vastly  different  thing,  and 
the  legitimate  business  of  art  always  and  ever:  seem- 
ing-true, verisimilitude  —  that  is  the  magic  word  — 
the  shibboleth  of  the  histrio,  and  of  all  artists,  whatever 
be  their  medium  of  expression.  And  this  difference 
between  art  and  life  is  a  thing  little  realized  by  the 
Anglo-Saxon  mind,  practical  as  it  is,  and  not  over- 
interested  in  the  affairs  of  artistic  representation.  No 
American  actor  more  exquisitely  illustrated  the  natural 
method  of  impersonation  than  the  late  Joseph  Jefferson. 
Luckily,  the  present  generation  of  playgoers  was 
brought  up  on  him  and  can  appreciate  the  reference. 
And  yet,  as  William  Winter  says  in  his  admirable  life 
of  the  great  comedian,  that  which  came  to  the  auditor's 
ear  as  a  sigh,  left  the  actor's  lips  as  a  cry:  the  artificial 
heightening  of  effect,  necessary  to  carry  to  the  last 
seat  of  the  theater,  was  there  steadily,  and  had  to  be 
there,  to  secure  the  desired  result. 

The  difference  between  good  and  bad  stage  art,  be- 

183 


Xittle  Essays  tn  Xfterature  an&  %tfe 

tween  a  Jefferson  and  one  of  the  Bulls  of  Bashan  who 
bellow  forth  their  lines  and  throw  the  whole  picture 
out  of  focus,  is  that,  while  both  are  trying  to  do  the 
same  thing,  one  is  doing  it  by  artistic,  cunningly  con- 
cealed methods,  the  other  by  methods  disgustingly  un- 
concealed. In  the  same  way  the  platform  speaker  who 
knows  his  business  and  proposes  to  use  the  modern 
realistic  technic,  strives  for  an  effect  of  colloquial,  off- 
hand utterance  which  nevertheless  differs,  as  the  earth 
from  the  heavens,  from  the  conversational  tone  of  life. 
To  prove  this,  listen  to  a  tyro  who  mounts  the  rostrum 
and  endeavors  to  chat  familiarly  with  an  audience,  as  he 
would  with  two  or  three  friends  in  private;  you  are 
sorry  for  that  man,  and  still  more  sorry  for  his  hearers. 
Indeed,  he  becomes  ridiculous. 

There  is  a  law  of  the  platform  as  inexorable  as  that 
of  gravitation:  in  proportion  as  his  audience  increases 
in  size,  must  the  speaker  enlarge  all  his  method:  his 
voice  must  become  more  orotund,  his  diction  change  to 
ampler  rhythm,  his  gestures,  so  far  as  he  makes  any, 
be  accommodated  to  the  larger  space  through  which 
they  must  travel.  What  would  be  just  right  for  a 
hundred  people  becomes  painfully  inadequate  for  a 
thousand;  and  if  five  thousand  be  present,  there  is  as 
much  difference,  in  the  technical  demand,  from  the 
audience  half  the  size,  as  there  would  be  between  that 
and  the  small  audience  first  assumed.  These  secrets 
of  the  charnel-house  do  not  need  to  be  realized,  of 
course,  by  those  in  front.  But  it  is  perhaps  well  that 


®n  Being  "matural" 

the  difficulties  be  occasionally  brought  to  mind,  in 
order  to  give  a  more  intelligent  comprehension  of  all 
art.  The  important  principle,  universally  applicable, 
is  that  it  would  not  be  art  did  it  not  differ  from  life. 
And  whenever  that  remark  is  made,  intended  as  a 
criticism,  with  regard  to  the  actor  walking  through  his 
role,  we  may  safely  say  two  things  about  it:  that  it 
is  an  unintended  and  naif  compliment;  and  that  it 
also  is  an  exposure  of  the  speaker's  complacent  igno- 
rance of  the  very  elements  of  all  good  art. 

I  remember  that  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  in  one  of  his 
essays,  holds  forth  on  the  thought  that  God,  since  he 
has  created  a  beautiful  universe,  is  a  great  artist.  And 
he  pens  this  sentence :  "  Art  is  the  perfection  of  Na- 
ture," meaning  by  perfection  the  perfecting  of  what  is 
offered  in  the  natural  world.  It  is  a  deep  saying  by 
the  seventeenth  century  essayist.  In  a  single,  brief 
sentence  he  tells  the  whole  story  so  often  lost  sight  of 
in  modern  criticism.  That  is  just  what  art  is,  and 
therein  lies  its  difference  from  the  natural.  It  is  not 
mere  reproduction  of  things  in  the  world;  it  is  re- 
presentation, or  presenting  again,  and  with  a  change. 
The  change,  the  difference,  involves  greater  symmetry, 
the  exclusion  of  all  that  is  irrelevant  and  not  signifi- 
cant, a  clearer  bringing  out  of  the  meaning  of  it  all: 
that  meaning  which,  in  life  itself,  is  often  so  misunder- 
stood, so  sadly  beriddled  and  obscure. 

In  other  words,  it  is  the  business  of  art  to  make  us 
see  life  with  new  eyes,  see  it  mayhap  for  the  first  time, 

185 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

because  we  have  been  so  immersed  in  its  tangle  and 
stunned  by  its  discordant  noises  as  never  before  to  have 
stopped,  listened  and  understood.  Watts's  female 
figure  in  his  great  picture,  "  Hope,"  is  shown  with 
bandaged  eyes,  bending  down  to  her  harp,  breathlessly 
listening;  to  what?  Surely,  to  that  inner  harmony  of 
things  which  unlocks  the  secret  of  a  world.  Going 
about  our  business  day  by  day,  we  hear  it  not;  neither 
the  still,  small  voice  within,  nor  the  supernal  music 
ever  sounding  for  us  if  only  we  have  ears  to  hear  and 
can  shut  out  the  harsh  sounds  that  circle  us  in  life. 
And  along  comes  art  to  do  us  this  service:  to  show 
us  perfect  shapes  where  we  see  distortion ;  to  strike  rich 
chords  of  music,  where  for  the  most  part  our  ears  are 
assaulted  by  mundane  jars  and  shrieks  and  winnings; 
to  set  down  sweet,  high  things  in  books,  when  the 
language  of  the  street  is  mostly  hieroglyphics;  and  to 
send,  as  if  from  heaven  itself,  a  promise  of  perfection 
upon  the  myriad  imperfections  of  earth. 

Wise  is  he  who  sees  that  this  is  being  more  than 
"  natural,"  and  that  the  divinity  of  art  lies  in  the  dif- 
ference. 


1 86 


Hutbor  as 

TN  the  ''Letters  of  George  Meredith"  we  find 
•*•  that  great  Victorian  author  refusing  a  newspaper 
interviewer  with  the  remark  that,  in  his  opinion,  the 
public  has  no  business  with  the  private  and  personal 
affairs  of  writers,  save  "  as  they  are  reputedly  good 
citizens." 

The  words  are  significant,  especially  as  they  are 
squarely  opposed  to  the  current  theory.  Meredith  be- 
lieved and  meant  to  say  that  an  author's  private  life  is 
in  a  sense  the  public's,  because  there  is  an  obligation 
upon  him  to  make  his  life  square  with  his  work.  By 
implication  he  would  contend  that  a  bad  personal  rep- 
utation would  injure  the  work  in  so  far  as  it  did  not 
correspond  with  the  writer's  professional  and  public 
utterances:  a  knowledge  by  the  reader  of  the  disparity 
between  work  and  life  leading  to  disillusionment  and 
consequent  failure  of  effect. 

This  sounds  very  homely  and  old-fashioned,  but  is 
all  the  more  needed  for  that  reason.  It  is  of  consider- 
able significance  that  a  confessed  giant  of  nineteenth 
century  English  literature  should  have  felt  this  way. 
The  doctrine  of  the  complete  divorcement  of  work 
from  life,  of  art  from  moral  obligation,  is  vastly  pop- 

187 


Xittle  Bssass  in  Xiterature  anfc  Xffe 

ular  of  late  years.  It  has  become  somewhat  quaint  to 
suggest  that  a  great  writer  should  be  a  decent  man; 
that  his  audience  has  a  right  to  expect  him  to  have 
some  sense  of  noblesse  oblige.  It  was  taken  as  a  mat- 
ter of  course  in  earlier  days,  when  authors  like  Dickens, 
Reade,  and  Kingsley  in  England,  or  Longfellow,  Whit- 
tier,  and  Holmes  in  America  would  have  been  as- 
tonished if  anybody  had  argued  with  them  that  the 
reading  public  had  neither  rights  nor  interest  in  their 
personal  conduct.  The  elder  school  of  American 
writers  has  won  its  present  position  in  part  because  as  a 
group  it  represented  ideals  of  conduct  and  character, 
as  well  as  accomplishment  in  letters. 

But  we  have  changed  all  that.  To  be  degenerate  is 
now  one  way  of  setting  up  a  claim  to  originality, —  as 
if  it  were  not  more  original  to  be  good  than  bad;  if 
you  doubt  it,  consult  statistics.  And  any  notion  that  a 
genius  should  obey  the  laws  that  alone  make  society 
possible  is  smiled  at  as  too  puerile  to  discuss.  Genius 
is  insanity,  cries  Nordau,  why  then  expect  it  to  be  other 
than  irregular!  How  preciously  worth  while  the  evil 
course  of  life  of  this  poet,  says  a  distinguished  critic, 
when  it  gave  us  such  and  such  a  sonnet! 

The  latter-day  criers-up  of  moral  irresponsibility 
should  be  a  little  less  loud-mouthed  and  arrogant;  be- 
fore assuming  that  their  contention  is  right,  and  the 
Meredithian  view  antique  and  wrong,  they  might  at 
least  first  furnish  us  with  the  demonstration  of  the 
practical  results  of  their  theory:  give  us  authors  who 
1 88 


Hutbor  as  Cftijen 

swear  by  the  new  creed  and  give  the  world  books  of 
anything  like  equal  caliber  with  the  despised  elders  who 
were  so  naif  as  actually  to  think  there  was  a  con- 
nection between  a  man's  way  of  living  and  the  expres- 
sion of  himself  and  his  experience  in  life  which  we 
call  literature.  Contribution  against  contribution,  the 
comparison  should  have  a  rather  sobering  effect  upon 
the  advocates  of  go-as-you-please  ethics. 

The  complete  fallacy  in  the  idea  that  the  two  can  be 
or  should  be  severed  may  be  stated  in  this  way:  man, 
generically,  is  a  morally  responsible  being.  That  basal 
fact  was  settled  some  time  ago,  and  remains  placidly 
unshaken  by  all  the  parlor  pseudo-philosophers  and 
posing  perverts  from  Adam  to  annihilation.  And  an 
author  is  nothing  more  nor  less  than  man,  writing. 
Ergo,  since  the  greater  contains  the  less,  inasmuch  as 
the  human  race,  whether  it  pleases  particular  members 
thereof  or  not,  comes  and  must  come  under  the  moral 
law,  any  attempt  to  exempt  the  author  from  human 
responsibility  is  futile,  silly  and  fatuously  illogical. 
The  author  must  pay  the  penalty,  as  well  as  enter 
on  the  privilege,  of  being  a  human  being  in  his  art, 
quite  as  truly  as  he  must  in  his  life.  He  does  not  cease 
to  be  the  one  when  he  becomes  the  other.  To  dodge  this 
plain  fact  is  to  move  in  the  direction  of  vain  striving, 
repulsive  excesses  and  false  thinking. 

It  is  really  extraordinary,  nevertheless,  how  many 
folk  seem  impatient  to-day,  in  print  or  out  of  it,  at  any 
apparent  restraint  (as  they  term  it)  upon  the  personal 


Xtttle  Essays  in  Xiterature  an&  Xife 

action  of  those  who  influence  the  world  through  the 
spoken  and  written  word.  "  Let  them  give  us  worthy 
work,"  they  shout,  "  and  that  is  all  we  have  a  right  to 
ask;  anything  more  is  impertinent  meddling."  This 
would  be  not  only  plausible  but  convincing  if  only  one 
could  dispossess  one's  mind  of  the  very  modern  reflec- 
tion that  each  man  (including  all  writers)  is  a  part  of 
the  social  body,  and  that  nothing  is  surer  than  that 
we  may  not  live  apart  and  unto  ourselves  alone,  being 
rather  members  of  the  one  great  body,  which  sensi- 
tively feels  the  action  of  each  in  the  life  of  all.  The 
notion  that  the  genius  may,  like  Dundreary's  bird,  go 
and  flock  all  by  himself  in  a  corner,  does  not  belong 
in  the  twentieth  century,  but  savors  of  the  Dark  Ages. 
The  only  excuse  for  a  man  to  make  a  hermit  of  himself, 
either  mentally  or  physically,  in  this  enlightened  time, 
be  he  prince,  poet  or  peasant,  is  the  affliction  of  some 
disease  of  the  mind  or  body  which  makes  him  ob- 
jectionable to  his  fellow  men. 

Independence  of  soul,  freedom  in  expressing  one's 
views  and  conclusions,  is  of  the  very  essence  of  charac- 
ter, and  to  demand  of  the  writer  that  he  tamely  submit 
to  the  opinions  of  others  and  make  of  himself  a  sort 
of  household  pet,  instead  of  the  voice  of  one  crying  in 
the  wilderness,  were  of  all  things  most  foolish;  it 
would  eviscerate  letters  and  leave  only  imitation  and 
milk-and-water  amusement.  The  trouble  only  begins 
when  the  author  takes  advantage  of  the  liberty  properly 
granted  to  him  that  he  may  say  his  say  without  fear  or 
190 


Hutbot  as  Cftisen 

favor  and,  declaring  himself  practically  outside  and  be- 
yond all  law  and  order,  substitutes  license  for  liberty  and 
the  untrammeled  presentation  of  eccentricity  and  de- 
generacy for  a  sane  handling  of  life. 

The  fact  is,  we  incline  in  this  day  of  individualism  to 
talk  too  much  about  rights  and  too  little  about  duties, 
which  are  as  closely  associated  with  the  former  as  a 
man's  shadow  with  his  body.  There  is  a  good  philo- 
sophical argument  for  the  contention  that,  strictly 
speaking,  no  such  things  as  "  rights  "  exist.  What  we 
mean  by  the  word  is  that,  in  the  evolution  of  society, 
social  thought  comes  to  see  that  by  granting  certain 
privileges  to  the  individual  he  will  evolve  the  better, 
it  will  be  to  his  advantage,  and  therefore  make  for 
the  general  weal  as  well.  In  other  words,  a  right  is 
an  ethical  concession  made  by  society  upon  the  ba- 
sis of  an  altruistic  sentiment  and  commonsense. 
Whether  there  be  a  "  natural  right,"  in  the  usual 
meaning  of  the  phrase,  may  well  be  debated,  if  not 
doubted :  for  example,  woman's  rights.  But  no,  I  have 
registered  a  vow  in  heaven  to  leave  that  theme  alone! 


191 


California  flDission  fiMa? 

ONE  of  the  most  interesting  and  significant  of 
American  dramas  has  come  out  of  California 
life.  I  refer  to  the  so-called  mission  play,  given  with 
marked  success  for  ten  weeks  during  the  summer  of 
1912  at  San  Gabriel,  a  few  miles  outside  of  Pasadena. 
The  drama  is  the  work  of  John  S.  McGroarty,  a  Los 
Angeles  editor  and  historian,  who  has  long  studied 
the  state  annals. 

A  little  group  of  enthusiasts,  fired  by  the  thought  of 
an  impressive  pageant  play  which  should  tell  the  story 
of  the  founding  of  the  Spanish  missions  along  the 
beautiful  southern  coast,  banded  themselves  together 
to  make  the  dream  a  reality.  Just  across  the  way 
from  the  quaint  old  mission  church  which  tourists  visit 
as  a  matter  of  course,  they  erected  a  unique  theater 
building  in  the  mission  style  to  house  the  idea;  and 
there  at  last,  to  the  sound  of  a  great  bell  hung  from 
the  dark  rafters  stained  to  suggest  the  past,  the  superb 
tapestried  curtain,  set  in  a  great  gilt  frame  as  if  it 
were  some  rich  old  medieval  picture,  parted  and  the 
audience  saw  the  blue  Pacific,  with  a  jutting  headland 
on  the  horizon  and  sundry  lazing  Spanish  soldiers  in 
192 


Ube  California  /iDission 

the  foreground.  It  was  a  scene  finely  suggesting  the 
picturesqueness  of  the  vanished  years. 

The  play  is  cast  in  three  acts,  and  the  central  figure 
is  Father  Junipero,  the  pioneer  priest  leader  of  the 
wonderful  early  work.  For  two  acts  he  is  before  the 
spectator:  first  at  False  Bay  in  1769,  in  the  days  when 
he  was  striving,  with  intense  religious  fervor,  to  con- 
vert the  native  Indians.  The  half-starved  Spaniards  of 
the  expedition  are  deaf  to  his  passionate  pleading  that 
they  remain  until  his  mission  be  accomplished.  The 
governor,  Don  Caspar  de  Portola,  has  gone  to  Mon- 
terey for  help ;  he  returns  with  his  troopers  nearly  dead 
from  privations.  The  priest  begs  them  not  to  go  back 
to  Mexico,  and  just  as  he  seems  to  fail,  the  relief  ship, 
sharp  limned  against  the  sunset,  rounds  Point  Loma; 
Junipero's  prayer  is  answered.  It  makes  a  splendid 
stage  picture  for  the  first-act  curtain. 

In  act  second  we  are  within  the  walls  of  the  mission 
of  San  Carlos;  a  generation  has  passed,  and  Father 
Junipero  is  an  old,  white-haired  man.  To  him  flock 
the  padres  from  the  other  missions  scattered  up  and 
down  the  California  shore;  he  has  seen  the  travail  of 
his  soul  and  is  satisfied;  for,  as  one  after  the  other 
makes  his  report,  we  hear  of  Indians  christianized  by 
the  thousands,  where  before  not  a  single  baptism  had 
occurred.  After  the  reports  there  is  merry-making; 
Indians  and  Spaniards  dance  and  sing  their  typical 
songs.  And  with  Junipero's  prayer  for  the  welfare  of 
the  mission  long  after  he  has  departed,  which  must 
193 


Xittle  Essays  in  Xtterature  anD  %tfe 

be  soon,  the  act  closes.  It  is  a  charming  scene,  full  of 
bustle,  color,  and  truth, —  though  far  less  dramatic 
than  the  previous  one. 

The  final  stage  of  the  story  is  enacted  at  the  ruined 
mission  of  San  Juan  Capistrano  in  the  year  1847. 
The  padres  are  dead,  their  work  is  forgotten;  an  old 
Mexican  caretaker  guards  the  place  for  the  Ameri- 
canos, and  the  gaunt  Indians  in  the  desert  dare  hardly 
approach  it.  A  beautiful  Spanish  senora,  type  of  the 
old  regime,  enters,  rebukes  the  present  greed  that  pro- 
fanes God's  temple,  and  says  a  sad  farewell  to  the 
past: 

"  Farewell,  dear  place.  Sleep  well,  ye  tender  dead 
padres,  my  countrymen.  No  more  thy  feet  shall  come 
again.  Fallen  is  the  altar,  and  the  roof  is  in  the  dust. 
San  Juan  of  God,  farewell." 

While  the  tragic  poetry,  the  wistful,  backward- 
looking  pathos  of  this  last  picture  is  undeniable,  dramat- 
ically it  is  weak;  and  a  serious  artistic  blemish  in  the 
piece  as  a  whole  lies  in  the  elimination  of  the  central 
personage,  Junipero,  whose  career  binds  together  two- 
thirds  of  the  play.  Even  in  an  historical  pageant  this 
jars  one's  sense  of  unity.  The  change,  too,  to  the 
melancholy,  at  times  bitter,  note  of  protest  is  a  ques- 
tionable shift  of  key,  and  the  introduction  of  a  miracle 
—  the  sudden  illumination  of  a  golden  cup  set  upon 
an  altar  after  the  manner  of  the  Holy  Grail  —  again 
suggests  an  appeal  less  broadly  sympathetic  than  that 
of  the  preceding  acts. 

194 


ZTbe  California  Mission 

But  one  prefers  to  dwell  upon  the  excellencies  of 
both  play  and  performance,  which  are  many.  The 
parts  of  Junipero  and  the  senora  are  admirably  han- 
dled by  C.  H.  Horning  and  Lilian  Burkhardt,  and  the 
subsidiary  characters  are  all  acted  in  a  way  to  produce 
any  exceptional  ensemble  effect.  But  the  dominant 
memory  is  of  the  wonderfully  effective  groupings  and 
massings  whereby  broad  pictures  are  given,  ever  re- 
composing,  yet  never  at  loose  ends.  About  three  hun- 
dred people  are  so  manipulated  that  no  one  appears 
supernumerary,  but  rather  each  becomes  an  organic 
part  of  the  composition.  Richard  Mansfield,  Henry 
Irving,  or  Beerbohm  Tree  at  their  best  never  sur- 
passed these  California  players  in  this  respect,  so  vital 
to  the  success  of  a  spectacle.  The  credit  for  this 
handling  of  a  mob  is  due  to  Mr.  Horning,  while  the 
scenic  side  is  the  work  of  Henry  Kabierske. 

Between  the  acts,  curtains  are  drawn  covering  aper- 
tures at  the  sides  of  the  theater,  and  through  these 
one  walks  out  to  a  path  which  circles  the  building, 
and  displays  models  of  all  the  missions,  with  their 
dates  given,  against  a  painted  background  of  mountain 
and  sky.  Seen  from  within  the  darkened  auditorium, 
the  loopholes  make  a  perfect  illusion,  one  in  tone  with 
the  .subject-matter  on  the  stage. 

I  saw  the  play  twice,  the  second  time  at  the  last 

matinee   of   the   season,   when    the   large   house   held 

twenty-five   hundred   people.     So   great  has   been   the 

success  of  the  venture  this  year  that  the  drama  will 

195 


Little  Essays  in  Literature  anfc  Life 

again  be  given  daily,  and  the  intent  is  to  make  it  a 
permanent  entertainment.  While  I  do  not  doubt  that 
it  would  win  plaudits  anywhere,  there  is  a  peculiar 
fitness  in  continuing  it  at  San  Gabriel,  so  rich  in 
Spanish  memories,  amid  a  setting  in  harmony  with  its 
sentiment  and  story. 

Such  a  pageant  play  is  more  than  amusement.  In 
producing  it,  California,  with  her  unexcelled  oppor- 
tunities for  historic  pageantry,  has  placed  it  with  such 
other  pageants  in  this  country  as  those  of  Gloucester, 
Peterborough,  and  Chicago,  notifying  the  American 
public  that  it  is  as  yet  hardly  awake  to  the  fine  pos- 
sibilities of  utilizing  native  history  in  memorial  scenic, 
musical,  and  dramatic  forms,  in  suchwise  as  to  illu- 
minate the  dry  annals  of  the  past  droned  over  in  school, 
and  so  to  stimulate  patriotism  in  the  younger  genera- 
tion. It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  state  of 
California  could  afford  to  pay  the  entrance  fee  to  this 
mission  play  for  all  the  children  of  the  commonwealth, 
for  the  sake  of  its  influence  in  fostering  intelligent 
citizenship.  When  a  more  enlightened  view  of  the 
theater,  and  of  education  in  general,  prevails,  such 
expenditures  will  be  a  matter  of  course. 

Surely  here  is  one  of  the  pleasant  signs  of  the  day: 
history  and  religion  brought  home  to  the  multitude 
through  scene  and  act.  It  made  me  realize  anew  the 
power  of  the  play  when,  as  in  the  elder  days,  it  was 
devoted  to  the  noblest  themes  and  was  openly  aimed 
at  the  souls  of  men. 

196 


H  TRemarfc  of  Ibajittt's 

WILLIAM  HAZLITT,  in  one  of  his  essays, 
dilates  upon  the  superficial  treatment  of  char- 
acter on  the  stage,  compared  with  character  as  it  is 
delineated  in  fiction.  "  The  stage,"  he  says,  "  shows 
us  the  masks  of  men,  and  the  pageant  of  the  world ; 
books  let  us  into  their  souls  and  lay  open  to  us  the 
secrets  of  our  own." 

Hazlitt,  mighty  book  lover  that  he  was,  and  having 
his  own  time  in  mind,  was  quite  justified  in  the  remark. 
Yet  it  is  the  distinction  of  the  new  era  in  drama  to  out- 
date  his  view,  because  the  stage  has  now,  for  a  genera- 
tion, been  drawing  human  beings  and  presenting  them 
with  more  and  more  of  the  care  and  faithful  transcrip- 
tion of  truth  which  formerly  were  the  peculiar  province 
of  that  other  form  of  story-telling  which  we  commonly 
call  fiction. 

Little  by  little,  the  drama  has  striven  for  a  more 
truthful  picture  of  life,  and  has  gradually  tried  to  avoid 
the  conventional  treatment  of  men  and  women  which 
the  stern  limitation  of  the  theater  and  a  tradition  which 
placed  plot  before  characterization  have  imposed  upon 
the  playmaker.  Such  dramatists  to-day  as  Pinero  and 
Jones,  Barrie,  Shaw,  Galsworthy  and  Bennett,  to  name 
197 


Xittle  B0sas0  in  ^Literature  anfc  SLife 

but  a  conspicuous  few,  have  limned  human  beings  with 
a  fidelity  to  the  facts  such  as  was  unknown  fifty  years 
ago. 

Plot  has  been  subordinated  to  this  purpose  of  reveal- 
ing character,  and  so  teaching  the  world  of  spectators 
with  regard  to  the  great  fundamental  laws  of  social  life. 
The  individual's  relation  to  society,  society's  effect  upon 
the  individual,  the  rights,  duties,  obligations  and 
dangers  of  the  person  in  his  relation  to  others  in  the 
social  complex:  to  portray  these  have  become  the  aim 
and  ambition  of  our  best  and  most  representative 
dramatists.  Their  function  has  been  taken  more  seri- 
ously than  ever  before,  and  the  drama  resulting,  while 
it  may  have  sometimes  sacrificed  something  of  the 
pleasurableness  of  the  picture,  has  thereby  gained  in 
depth,  and  breadth,  and  serious  meaning.  It  is  this 
new  seriousness  of  purpose,  this  attempt  to  interpret 
with  truthfulness  character  in  its  relation  to  society, 
which  is  the  essential  stamp  of  the  drama  of  to-day. 

It  must  not  be  lost  sight  of,  however,  that  the  inevi- 
table restrictions  of  the  stage,  whereupon  a  piece  of  life 
has  to  be  exhibited  in  about  two  hours'  time,  whereas  a 
novel  can  in  leisurely  fashion  trace  through  six  or  seven 
hundred  pages  the  minutiae  of  the  interactions  of  a 
group  of  lives,  cannot  do,  and  never  will,  what  fiction 
can,  in  the  subtle  analysis  of  motives,  impulses,  and 
thoughts.  The  drama  means  action  above  all  else,  as 
the  etymology  of  the  word  shows.  Therefore,  in  the 
main,  character  must  be  shown  in  its  external  indica- 
198 


H  IRemark  of 

tions  of  action,  and  woe  to  that  playwright,  be  he 
Granville  Barker  or  another,  who  endeavors  within 
his  "  two  hours'  traffic  of  the  stage  "  to  present  the 
smaller  signs  of  character  differentiation;  he  must  put 
his  finger  upon  the  big  things,  the  things  that  are  char- 
acteristic, revelatory,  convincing,  and  leave  the  other 
method  to  be  used  by  the  sister  form  of  fiction. 

This  the  audience  has  a  right  to  demand;  and  in 
spite  of  its  increasing  willingness  to  see  a  finer,  more 
discriminating  handling  of  men  and  women  on  the 
stage,  so  that  the  villain  is  seen  to  have  his  good  points, 
and  the  hero  his  human  failings,  any  attempt  to  use  a 
Henry  James  canvas  and  paint  with  a  camel's-hair 
brush  is  foredoomed  to  failure  and  ought  to  be.  The 
dramatist  must  not  blur  his  figures,  and  for  him  the 
cardinal  virtue  is  clearness. 

Fiction  can  always  say  a  thing  and  take  it  back ;  not 
so  the  play,  which  must  say  a  thing,  say  it  hard,  repeat 
it,  and  stick  to  it.  It  is  good  technic  in  a  novel  to  fool 
the  reader  by  a  surprise  at  the  end ;  Anna  Katherine 
Green  has  taken  money  from  us  all  in  that  way.  But 
it  should  not  be  done  on  the  stage,  where  the  proper 
method  is  to  let  the  audience  into  a  secret  not  yet  dis- 
covered by  the  stage  people ;  our  pleasure  in  part  comes 
from  our  superior  knowledge,  as  we  watch  to  see  how 
the  dramatis  personae  will  act  when  they  come  to  learn 
what  we  already  know. 

With  this  reservation,  we  may  fairly  take  pride  in 
the  fact  that  an  advance  in  the  drama  has  largely  nulli- 
199 


OLfttle  Essays  fn  ^Literature  an& 

fied  Hazlitt's  remark.  Using  a  broader  method,  and 
obeying  the  stage  limitations,  it  is  fast  furnishing  us 
with  portraits  of  humanity  as  it  is  to-day  which  at  the 
best  rival  the  fine  characterizations  of  fiction.  Not 
merely  masks  are  they,  but  living  souls;  and  beneath 
the  "  pageant  of  the  world,"  in  Hazlitt's  phrase,  we  are 
able  to  detect  and  take  pleasure  in  the  recognition  of 
the  springs  of  action  and  the  contours  of  life. 


200 


fiDarfc  Gwain 

A  GREAT  humorist  is  only  such  when  he  is  more 
than  humorist.  He  must  be  a  thinker,  a  moralist, 
a  reformer.  Recall  Rabelais,  Aristophanes,  Cervantes, 
Shakspere,  and  Dickens,  to  see  how  true  it  is.  Man 
laughs  because,  dowered  with  self-consciousness,  he  is 
aware  of  the  tragedy  of  life  with  its  incongruities, 
ironies  and  antinomies,  and  needs  the  alleviation  of 
fun,  the 

Respite,  respite  and  Nepenthe. 

The  humorist  comes  to  make  him  smile  sympathetic- 
ally at  the  foibles  of  humanity,  to  satirize  folly  and 
fraud,  and  to  remind  him  of  the  brotherhood  of  the 
race.  If  he  did  no  more  than  soothe  pain  and  sorrow, 
he  would  be  most  welcome,  his  mission  salutary;  but 
when  the  humorist  rises  to  his  highest  power,  he  not 
only  smiles  away  care,  but  castigates  the  sinner 
(Juvenal  with  his  castigat  ridendo),  and  while  he  shakes 
the  midriff  with  Homeric  laughter  sweetens  the  air  and 
the  soul  of  man  with  charitable  thoughts.  Every  nation, 
like  every  man,  is  known  by  the  company  it  keeps ;  if  it 
produces  a  great  humorist,  the  race  is  revealed  by  and 
in  him,  because  in  the  mood  of  play,  of  fun  and  laugh- 
201 


Xtttle  Bssass  in  Xtterature  an&  Xife 


ter,  one  catches  it  off  guard  and  listens  to  the  very 
heart-beat  of  a  people. 

Mark  Twain  was  intensely  modern,  democratic,  rep- 
resentatively American.  To  those  who  knew  him 
personally,  —  and  that  privilege  was  mine  for  years  as 
his  Hartford  neighbor,  —  he  was  worlds  removed  from 
the  newspaper  funny  man.  He  was  no  mountebank  in 
motley  wear,  shaking  the  fool's  zany  for  the  momen- 
tary, thoughtless  merriment  of  the  crowd,  but  a  wise, 
sane,  deep-souled  man  teaching  us  the  lesson  of  life. 

Indeed,  in  private  conversation  he  was  the  most 
serious-minded,  yes,  somber-minded  man  I  have  ever 
known.  Certain  external  denotements  were,  of  course, 
laugh-provoking:  the  rich,  nasal  drawl,  the  racy  idiom 
that  was  as  natural  to  him  as  the  drawing  of  breath. 
But  the  mind  was  ever  sober,  even  solemn.  His  mind 
was  broad  and  faced  the  awful  realities  of  life;  his 
heart  was  bigger  yet,  and  no  man  so  richly  endowed 
emotionally  could  snicker  over  trivialities.  That  is 
the  first  thing  to  realize  about  him. 

For  this  reason,  his  career,  splendidly  successful  as 
the  world  rates  success,  was  in  a  sense  tragic.  The 
great  reading  public  and  those  who  did  not  read,  yet 
to  whom  his  name  was  a  household  word,  as  once 
were  the  names  of  Barnum  and  Beecher,  insisted  on 
taking  him  as  a  funny  man.  He  felt  that  he  could 
hardly  get  a  contemporary  hearing  for  what  was  in 
him,  —  or,  at  least,  for  what  was  deepest.  Doubtless, 
there  were  elements  of  his  genius  which  gave  some 
202 


/iDarfe 

ground  for  this:  exaggeration,  irreverence,  horse  play. 
But  to  stop  there  were  pitifully  to  misunderstand  the 
man.  Hardly  a  book  of  his  fails  to  have  an  underlying 
serious  purpose,  the  reformatory  instinct,  the  corrective 
suggestion.  If  he  made  fun  of  King  Arthur's  time,  he 
wished  to  show  the  false  romanticizing  over  the  past 
and  to  cry  up  the  present  as  a  better  day.  If  he  at- 
tacked Christian  Science  or  the  Bacon-Shakspere  ques- 
tion, it  was  not  primarily  for  the  sake  of  ridicule,  but 
to  point  out  what  seemed  to  him  the  dangerous  ab- 
surdity of  a  certain  view.  It  is  so  throughout  his 
works. 

Mark  Twain  made  fun  of  many  things.  But  of 
one  thing  he  was  as  tender  as  a  woman,  as  loyal  as 
a  lover,  as  delicate  as  a  maid:  namely,  the  good  that 
is  in  common  humanity.  The  reverence  and  faith  that 
were  royally  in  his  nature  were  given  to  this  cause, 
and  he  wrought  for  righteousness  as  he  saw  it.  He 
hated  Sham  as  the  devil  hates  holy  water.  This  it 
was  which  made  him  so  American,  and  in  a  true  sense 
a  moralist.  He  was  a  believer  in  the  dignity  and 
worth  of  humankind,  especially  under  crude,  new- 
world  conditions ;  in  other  words,  he  was  in  the  widest, 
deepest  sense  a  democrat.  Of  the-  people  himself,  he 
stood  for  them,  spoke  for  them,  understood  and  loved 
them.  He  was,  in  this  respect,  of  the  lineage  of  Lin- 
coln. And  so,  while  his  method  and  manner  may 
shock  some  to  whom  conventions  and  traditions  are 
paramount,  he  never  repels  us,  as  does  Dean  Swift  with 
203 


OLtttle  Essays  in  ^literature  an&  Xife 

his  savage,  almost  malignant  inhumanity,  or  Bernard 
Shaw  with  his  arrogant  disclaimer  of  emotional  values. 
One  never  gets  from  him 

The   laugh  mistimed  in   tragic  presences, 

—  there  is  never  bitterness  in  his  mirth.  I  know  that 
he  was  in  heart  a  sad  man;  but  whatever  the  private 
sorrow,  it  was  not  allowed  to  sour  the  written  word. 
As  a  man  of  letters  he  had  a  sense,  none  keener,  of 
the  obligations  of  art. 

Mark  Twain  was  a  voluminous  writer,  a  man  of 
perhaps  forty  books.  Naturally,  time  will  slowly 
decimate  the  list.  But  it  is  not  difficult  even  for  a 
contemporary  to  see  that  certain  works  will  be  chosen 
out  of  his  long,  toilful  effort  to  mark  his  quality.  The 
forms  of  his  work  are  many,  yet  at  bottom  he  was  an 
essayist;  and  travel-sketch,  tale,  full-length  fiction, 
speech,  and  historical  study  were  all  essay,  because  they 
were  just  Mark  Twain  talking,  revealing  beneath  this 
or  that  veil  his  striking  personality  and  setting  forth, 
for  the  benefit  of  fellow  men,  the  catholic  outlook 
and  inlook  of  a  remarkable  mind  and  a  generous  na- 
ture. 

Such  are  the  early  books,  "  Roughing  It "  and  "  In- 
nocents Abroad  " ;  both,  unlike  as  they  seem,  do  the 
same  service:  they  reveal  the  American  type  under  dif- 
ferent circumstances,  the  one  in  pioneer  days  on  his 
own  soil,  the  other  in  a  European  setting.  The 
American  at  Home  and  Abroad  might  well  be  the 
204 


jflDarfc  TTwain 

running  title.  Such  also  are  the  two  great  boy  books, 
"  The  Adventures  of  Tom  Sawyer  "  and  "  The  Ad- 
ventures of  Huckleberry  Finn,"  studies  of  the  Ameri- 
can lad  in  contrasted,  primitive  habitats  and  exhibiting 
him  in  his  habit  as  he  lived  in  now  bygone  days.  This 
brace  of  books,  the  former  largely  autobiographic,  con- 
stitutes the  epic  of  boyhood,  the  romance  and  poetry 
of  life,  seen  through  young  eyes  in  surroundings  that, 
to  a  gentler  training,  might  seem  harsh  and  homely. 
But  what  matters  that  the  speech  be  rustic,  that  the 
setting  be  crude,  that  the  incidents  smack  of  the  soil? 
Life  is  a  precious  thing  to  these  lads,  and  so  Huck  and 
Tom  will  last  with  the  quaint  English  speech  in  which 
they  are  embalmed,  and  keep  a  morning  freshness. 
Nor  is  there  aught  higher  or  harder  than  this  to  ac- 
complish in  the  literary  endeavor. 

Nor  in  the  category  of  his  best  should  that  beauti- 
ful little  masterpiece,  "  The  Prince  and  the  Pauper," 
be  forgotten ;  nor  a  score  of  short  stories,  among  which 
"  The  Jumping  Frog "  is  a  prime  favorite,  the  tale 
that  first  gave  him  fame.  Nor  can  we  overlook,  among 
the  later  works,  "  Life  on  the  Mississippi,"  wherein 
so  much  of  his  earlier  experience  finds  graphic  repro- 
duction ;  nor  that  strange,  haunting  novel,  "  Pud- 
d'nhead  Wilson,"  half  melodrama,  half  psychologic 
romance,  and  surely  one  of  the  finest  flowers  of  his 
gift.  Six  or  eight  books  like  these,  with  enough  other 
titles  to  round  out  a  dozen  volumes,  will  embrace  a 
permanent  contribution  to  American  history,  to  the 
205 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  !fcife 

native  letters,  in  truth,  to  the  literature  of  English 
speech.  The  British  critics  have  been  inclined  to  say 
this,  before  the  American. 

Perhaps  he  repeated  himself  in  his  maturest  work, 
at  least  externally;  but  there  are  qualities  both  of 
thought  and  of  temperament  in  the  writings  of  his  last 
years  not  so  fully  disclosed  in  the  books  that  came  be- 
fore. He  matured  late,  and  grew  mellower,  sweeter, 
more  perceptive  to  the  end.  In  thinking  of  Mark 
Twain  as  a  literary  force,  rather  than  as  a  Don  Quix- 
ote riding  atilt  against  all  the  windmills  of  Sham,  it 
must  also  be  borne  in  mind  that,  quite  aside  from 
humor,  much  of  his  writing  contains  passages  of  noble 
prose,  that  any  author  would  covet  to  claim.  Descrip- 
tive pages  in  "  Roughing  It "  there  are,  admirable  for 
picturesqueness,  melody  and  masculine  grip  on  the 
mother  tongue.  "The  Prince  and  the  Pauper"  is  a 
most  skilful  example  of  tonality,  the  right  key  steadily 
maintained.  The  boy  books,  before  mentioned,  are  a 
veritable  treasure  house  for  dialogue,  description  and 
dramatic  situation.  There  are  scenes,  too,  in  "  Pud- 
d'nhead  Wilson  "  unforgettable  for  reality  that  is  lifted 
into  romance  by  a  poet's  touch.  Nor  does  this  west- 
ern American  lose  strength  in  foreign  parts;  every 
reader  familiar  with  his  descriptions  of  travel  must 
feel  that  on  many  a  page,  Germany,  Italy  and  yet  other 
lands  are  limned  with  master  strokes.  Especially  is 
this  true  in  the  delineation  of  Nature,  where  often 
Mark  Twain  is  at  his  happiest.  It  was  the  commonly 
206 


Uwain 

expressed  opinion  in  the  old  Hartford  days  —  a  city 
then  the  haunt  of  writing  folk  —  that  here  was  a 
wonderful  talker,  a  prose  poet  in  his  daily  converse. 
Much  of  this  quality  got  into  his  books,  although  it 
may  be  obscured,  more  's  the  pity !  in  the  dominant  note 
of  broad  Rabelaisean  fun. 

In  the  final  reckoning  of  the  American  men  of  let- 
ters who  have  honored  us  by  carrying  the  country's 
name  beyond  our  borders,  but  a  very  few  appear  to  be 
of  assured  permanence.  We  know  now  that  Emerson 
and  Hawthorne  are  safe  to  be  of  the  number;  that 
Longfellow  and  Lowell  may  be  added  to  the  list,  and 
perchance  Whitman.  That  Mark  Twain  is  likely  to 
be  of  the  company,  few  critics  will  hesitate  to  affirm. 
It  is  a  select  gathering,  but  our  master  humorist,  who 
taught  us  to  see  life  with  sane  vision,  to  respect  our 
own,  and  who  commanded  tears  and  smiles  as  only 
the  great  men  have,  for  both  correction  and  consola- 
tion, will  not  shame  the  others.  Meanwhile  he  has 
sure  haven  in  innumerable  human  hearts. 

To  one  who  remembers  him  in  former  days,  there 
is  something  appropriate  in  his  recent  passing.  The 
sometime  happy  home,  sanctified  by  love  and  lightened 
by  the  laughter  of  children,  had  been  long  since  broken 
by  the  insatiate  years;  one  by  one  the  dear  ones  had 
preceded  him  "  To  where  beyond  these  voices  there  is 
peace,"  and  as  these  inevitable  changes  marred  him, 
and  he  was  left  alone  and  lonesome,  a  piercing 
stanza  of  Wordsworth's  has  persisted  in  my  mind  as 
207 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Olife 

singularly    applicable,    felicitous    with    a   strange,    sad 
felicity : 

If  there  be  one  who  need  bemoan 

His  kindred  laid  in  earth, 
The  household  hearts  that  were  his  own, 

It  is  the  man  of  mirth. 

Yes,  Mark  Twain  had  earned  his  rest,  and  now  he 
takes  it,  by  the  side  of  his  beloved :  where,  at  the  last, 
every  man  would  fain  be: 

"He   loved  his  fellows  and  their  love  was  sweet; 
Plant  daisies  at  his  head  and  at  his  feet." 


208 


" 


Hntigone"  at  tbe  (Breefc  Gbeater 


/T"SO  witness  a  great  Greek  tragedy,  interpreted  by 
•*•  one  of  the  best  modern  actors,  in  a  Greek 
theater  which  is  the  most  perfect  reproduction  of  the 
ancient  model  in  existence,  and  in  a  setting  of  Nature 
of  such  incomparable  beauty  that  Greece  itself  could 
not  surpass  the  effect,  may  be  called  an  unusual  ex- 
perience. That  is  what  I  and  some  six  thousand  other 
human  beings  enjoyed  on  an  evening  in  June,  at 
Berkeley,  California,  —  an  evening  so  superb  that  it 
seemed  made  expressly  for  an  outdoor  performance. 
The  Greek  theater  on  the  campus  of  the  University 
of  California  was  the  gift  of  William  R.  Hearst  and 
is  a  restoration  of  the  theater  at  Epidaurus  dating  from 
the  fourth  century  B.  C.  It  seats  eight  thousand 
persons  and  is  built  upon  a  hillside  surrounded  by  a 
magnificent  grove  of  eucalyptus  trees.  The  stone  tiers 
rise  gleamingly  in  a  steep,  concentric  semicircle;  above 
and  back  of  them  is  the  stately  black  of  the  tall  tree 
boles,  the  susurrus  of  the  branches  seeming  to  make  a 
mystic  comment  on  the  scene;  while,  far  overhead,  the 
keen  glitter  of  stars,  the  wonderful  gold  stars  of  Cali- 
fornia, lights  the  demi-darkness  :  a  sort  of  supernal 
stage  setting  for  the  human  business  below.  This  site, 
209 


3Ltttie  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  %ife 

with  its  marvelous  natural  attractions,  had  been  used 
for  several  years  by  the  student  body  for  their  academic 
gatherings  when  President  Wheeler  drew  Mrs. 
Hearst's  attention  to  its  fitness  for  a  temple  of  art 
which  should  be  a  center  of  University  activities. 
Thereupon,  she  interested  her  son  in  the  idea,  with  the 
result  that  he  became  the  donor.  Here,  every  year 
now  since  the  theater  was  erected  in  1905,  admirable 
student  productions  of  drama  or  productions  by  visit- 
ing professionals  are  made :  Aristophanes'  "  The 
Birds";  Sophocles'  "GEdipus";  Racine's  "Phedre"; 
"  As  You  Like  It,"  with  Maude  Adams ;  the  morality 
play,  "  Everyman,"  by  the  original  English  company, 
and  Stephen  Phillips'  "  Nero  "  may  be  mentioned  as 
a  few  typical  performances.  The  theater  is  also  used 
for  lectures,  orchestral  concerts  and  the  commencement 
exercises,  its  splendid  acoustic  properties  making  it  an 
ideal  place  for  all  such  purposes.  When  it  was  empty 
I  stood  on  the  stage  and,  speaking  without  the  slightest 
change  from  a  conversational  tone,  was  perfectly  under- 
stood by  a  friend  in  the  topmost  seat.  In  this  respect 
is  it  almost  as  remarkable  as  the  Mormon  tabernacle  at 
Salt  Lake  City,  which,  it  will  be  recalled,  has  the  ad- 
vantage of  a  roofed  auditorium.  The  influence  of 
such  a  structure,  dedicated  to  such  usages,  upon  the 
life  of  the  University,  can  well  be  imagined. 

As   a  structure,   it  consists  of  the  auditorium  and 
the  stage  built  of  concrete,  raised  six  feet  from  the 
ground,   with   a   broad   walk   between   which   accom- 
210 


Ube  "Bntigone"  at  tbe  Greek  Ubeatet 

modates  the  orchestra.  The  semicircle  of  seats  meas- 
ures two  hundred  and  fifty-four  feet;  the  stage  is  one 
hundred  and  thirty-three  feet  long  with  a  depth  of 
twenty-eight  feet;  it  is  austerely  stripped  of  scenery, 
but  its  massive  back  wall,  representing  a  palace  front 
and  pierced  at  the  center  by  the  great  royal  door,  the 
entrance  for  the  characters  of  noble  lineage,  like  the 
gallery  above  the  Elizabethan  stage,  constitutes  an 
immensely  impressive  stage  setting.  This  stage  is 
larger  than  the  classic  model,  in  order  that  an  un- 
obstructed view  may  be  afforded  every  spectator.  In 
all  essentials,  however,  it  is  a  faithful  rendering  of 
that  theater  of  antiquity  which  Pausanias  declared  to 
be  the  most  beautiful  in  the  world,  as  it  is  to-day  the 
best  preserved. 

On  the  "  Antigone "  night  the  handling  of  lights 
was  very  skilful,  and  I  for  one  shall  never  forget 
the  effect  when,  at  the  drama's  beginning,  two  slaves 
appeared  at  the  palace  door  and  lighted  the  altar  flame, 
which  then  furnished  the  half-lucent  atmosphere  for 
the  doomed  girl's  first  entrance.  It  set  the  mood  at 
once;  back  flew  the  imagination,  two  thousand  years 
and  more;  the  glory  that  was  Greece  resumed  its 
old,  imperial  sway,  and  the  soul  was  attuned  to  the 
simple,  sculpturesque,  heroic,  tremendous  story  of  a 
sister's  love  for  a  brother  and  how  that  love  led  to 
many  deaths  —  an  elemental  tragedy  of  kin. 

So  many  fascinating  questions  were  raised  by  the 
performance  of  a  play  hitherto  only  known  by  the  re- 
211 


3Littie  Bssass  in  ^Literature  an&  Xite 


readings  of  many  years,  that  I  would  fain  make  a 
book  about  it  rather  than  a  brief  essay.  The  alleged 
fatalism  of  the  Greek  drama,  the  use  of  the  chorus, 
the  value  of  a  continuous  performance  (just  two  hours 
and  twenty  minutes  was  the  playing  time,  with  no 
modern  entr'acte  breaks),  the  relative  excellence  of 
the  ancient  heroic  and  modern  psychologic  style  of 
acting,  the  use  of  melodrama,  that  is,  music-drama, 
in  the  strict  etymological  sense,  these  and  yet  other 
problems  vital  to  the  scholar  throng  the  mind.  Per- 
sonally, I  was  so  exalted  by  this  evocation  of  the 
Past,  that  bed  seemed  an  absurdity,  and  I  welcomed 
an  invitation  to  an  after-theater  supper  in  San  Fran- 
cisco with  Miss  Anglin  as  hostess,  there  to  thresh  out 
with  her,  her  company,  and  such  persons  as  George 
Riddle,  who  was  the  actress's  right-hand  man  in  the 
production,  Percy  MacKaye,  and  James  O'Donnell 
Bennett,  the  flocking  questions  of  the  play,  the 
eternally  alluring  matters  of  art. 

But  the  broader  human  appeal  of  the  drama  and 
its  interpretation  by  the  players,  these  are,  I  suppose, 
of  widest  interest.  The  star's  work  was,  it  seemed 
to  me,  of  most  remarkable  power  and  loveliness.  At 
times  during  the  evening  I  caught  myself  in  the  query  : 
"  Could  Rachel  have  surpassed  this  ?  "  Miss  Anglin 
from  the  moment  of  her  first  entrance  firmly  seized 
the  Sophoclean  spirit  of  the  thing.  She  keyed  her 
rendition  to  that  antique  austerity  of  effect,  slow-mov- 
ing, stately,  which  is  of  the  very  essence  of  Greek 
212 


ZTbe  "Bntioone"  at  tbe  Creefe  Ubeater 

genius.  It  was  a  terribly  difficult  task  for  a  player 
whose  forte  lies  in  the  plastic  modulations  of  modern 
emotional  work,  like  "  Mrs.  Dane's  Defense,"  in 
which  I  had  just  seen  her.  It  speaks  much  for  Miss 
Anglin's  art  that  she  could  pass  from  that  instantly 
and  speak  blank  verse  poetry  with  the  noble  enlarge- 
ment which  properly  accompanies  the  statuesque  move- 
ment and  grave  tempo  of  the  Greek  drama. 

For  clarity  of  utterance  and  vocalic  range  and 
flexibility  her  voice  work  was  extraordinary:  not  a 
word,  not  a  syllable,  was  lost  by  the  great  audience, 
even  a  whisper  carried.  To  the  heated  imagination, 
it  was  as  if  the  very  stars  could  hear  and  vibrate  their 
approval.  Nothing  on  the  vocal  side  was  perhaps  so 
unique  as  her  deft  adjustment  of  the  speaking  voice  to 
certain  musical  notes  sounded  by  the  chorus  at  re- 
current moments,  when  she  not  so  much  spoke  as 
chanted  the  emotions  called  forth  by  the  poet's  senti- 
ments. Nobly,  too,  did  she  envisage  the  part;  not  a 
large  woman,  she  yet  conveyed  the  true  heroic  idea 
by  sweep  of  gesture,  amplitude  of  walk,  and  dignity 
of  carriage.  And  she  so  skilfully  blended  imperious 
moral  indignation  with  the  piteousness  of  forsaken, 
doomed  girlhood,  as  to  make  one  hear  the  flute  notes 
and  the  trumpet  notes,  defiance  and  pathos  inter- 
mingling, in  the  character  of  Antigone. 

The  support  was  admirable.  Eugene  Ormonde, 
Miss  Anglin's  leading  man  for  several  seasons,  played 
the  exceedingly  difficult  role  of  Creon,  the  king,  in 
213 


Xfttle  Essays  in  Xiterature  ant)  OLife 

a  way  to  bring  out  clearly  his  qualities  of  stiff-necked 
pride  and  slow  yielding  to  the  teachings  of  Fate.  Spe- 
cially good  was  the  leader  of  the  chorus,  and  the  mes- 
senger was  remarkably  vocalized  by  a  young  player, 
Eugene  Shakspere,  a  name  which  did  no  violence  to 
the  family  tradition.  The  seer  Tiresias,  in  the  hands 
of  John  R.  Crawford,  Creon's  son,  Hasmon,  played 
by  Howard  Hull,  and  Ismene,  Antigone's  sister, 
by  Miss  Frances  Jordan,  were  excellent  delineations 
all. 

It  may  be  said  of  the  cast,  as  a  whole,  that  they 
threw  themselves  with  keen  ardor  into  the  spirit  of 
the  piece  and  the  occasion,  as  the  star  most  generously 
acknowledged.  Mendelssohn's  lovely  music  for  the 
"  Antigone "  was  rendered  by  an  orchestra  of  fifty 
pieces  under  the  leadership  of  Dr.  Wulle,  head  of  the 
department  of  music  at  the  University,  and  was  well 
handled  both  by  chorus  and  orchestra.  But  I  for  one 
could  not  but  feel  that  it  was  too  modern,  too  romantic 
for  the  grand  simplicity  of  the  theme,  and  pulled  it 
in  the  direction  of  opera  at  times;  to  which  may  be 
added  that  the  words  of  the  chorus,  so  integral  a  part 
of  the  Greek  play,  the  poetico-philosophic  comment  on 
the  course  of  the  story,  a  function  like  that  of  the 
Prologue  and  Epilogue  in  earlier  English  drama,  were 
rarely  distinguishable.  Had  they  been  intoned  in 
unison,  it  might  perhaps  have  been  otherwise. 

One  opinion  I  am  confirmed  in,  after  hearing  the 
"  Antigone  " :  that  in  every  way  it  is  better  dramatic 
214 


TTbe  "HntfQone"  at  tbe  (Breefe  ^beater 

art,  and  more  enjoyable  for  the  spectators,  to  have  an 
uninterrupted  performance  of  a  play  instead  of  the 
stupid  modern  intermissions.  Sooner  or  later  (mark 
the  prophecy!)  we  shall  return  to  the  "scene  in- 
dividable  "  of  Shakspere  and  the  Greeks,  thereby  re- 
storing the  artistic  unity  of  the  play,  preserving  the 
proper  mood  on  the  part  of  the  auditor  and,  for  a 
practical  consideration,  getting  home  earlier  than  with 
the  present  mode.  The  two  hours  and  more  of  the 
"  Antigone  "  made  the  shortest  theater  evening  I  have 
experienced  for  years. 

It  is  the  usual  thing  to  say  that  the  Greek  drama 
was  fatalistic,  where  the  modern  is  a  drama  of  the 
human  will.  That  is,  the  Greek  represents  events  as 
controlled  by  an  outer  force,  the  gods  pushing  hu- 
mans to  their  destined  ends,  irrespective  of  their  at- 
tempts to  exercise  will  power.  I  have  questioned  this 
sweeping  statement,  for  myself,  for  years:  and  the 
doubt  was  deepened  by  witnessing  the  "  Antigone." 
To  be  sure,  there  is  a  sense  of  impending  doom  in  the 
cumulative,  dire  happenings  of  the  tale,  a  kind  of 
logic  of  the  tragic.  Yet  the  human  will  works  freely 
and  the  essence  of  the  tragic  clash  lies  in  the  con- 
trasted ideals  of  Creon,  who  stands  for  a  paramount 
sense  of  duty  to  the  state,  and  of  his  niece,  with 
whom  kin  ties  and  their  religious  obligations  come 
first.  In  other  words,  it  is  a  will  drama  quite  as 
truly  as  a  fate  drama,  all  professors  and  critics  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding.  And  I  suspect  that  this  is 
215 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Olife 

more  or  less  true  of  the  whole  body  of  so-called  classic 
drama. 

As  a  theme,  there  can  be  no  question  of  the  dramatic 
value  of  the  "  Antigone " ;  but  in  the  conductment 
thereof,  the  method  is  so  different  from  ours  as  to  make 
one  who  desires  the  sharp  sensations  of  the  modern 
"  curtain "  feel  cheated  of  his  due.  Many  were 
frankly  bored  by  the  performance,  as  I  could  gather 
from  remarks  in  the  audience.  For  one  illustrative 
detail :  within  five  minutes  of  Antigone's  first  entrance, 
practically  the  whole  story  is  before  the  spectators  and, 
in  truth,  the  Greek  audience,  speaking  by  and  large, 
knew  in  advance  the  great  myths  and  family  legends 
which  were  the  stock-in-trade  of  the  dramatists. 
Hence,  there  was  little  or  none  of  the  surprise,  the 
suspensive  interest,  so  much  coveted  in  our  modern 
play-making.  Nor  are  there  swift  or  subtle  moments 
in  this  drama;  for  those  you  must  substitute  the  stately 
massed  effects,  the  monumental,  not  to  say  marmoreal, 
woes  of  beings,  whose  flowing  robes  typify  the  large 
outlines,  the  majestic  depths  of  their  nature,  resting 
content  on  the  feeling  begotten  of  the  impersonal  march 
of  Fate  and  the  impenetrable,  mighty  minds  of 
the  eternal  gods.  Aristotle's  famed  remark,  that 
poetic  tragedy  should  purge  the  mind  through  the 
emotions  of  pity  and  terror,  receives  genuine  illumina- 
tion from  the  mere  witnessing  of  a  representative  Greek 
drama  adequately  performed.  It  somehow  gives  you 
a  sense  of  the  bigness,  the  awesomeness  of  life,  its 
216 


Ube  "Bnttgone"  at  tbe  (Breefe  ZTbeater 

stern  obeyance  of  law,  its  indestructible  moral  founda- 
tions ;  it  puts  "  the  fear  of  God,"  in  the  sense  of  the 
splendid  Old  Testament  phrase,  in  your  soul. 

And  so,  with  teeming  mind  and  awakened  imagina- 
tion, I  go  back  to  what  will  be  with  me  really  one  of 
the  few  great  memories.  O!  the  gold-dusted  deeps 
of  indigo  blue  night-sky,  the  rich,  romantic  music  of 
the  German  master,  the  demi-lights  of  the  stage,  with 
its  gleams  of  marble,  its  sweep  of  varicolored  gar- 
ments: and  just  beyond,  the  silence  of  the  vast,  hud- 
dled throng!  And  in  the  midst  of  it  all,  dominating 
the  scene,  and  touched  with  the  sacred  flame  of  genius 
as  if  she  had  snatched  a  live  coal  from  that  altar  fire 
out  of  the  past,  Margaret  Anglin,  evoking  for  us, 
across  the  gulf  of  twice  a  thousand  years,  sweet  words 
of  wisdom  and  of  song,  and  laying  bare  the  tortured 
heart  of  a  Greek  girl,  who,  in  the  noblest  sense,  loved 
most  wisely,  if  too  well.  The  great  art  of  the  world 
obliterates  time  and  civilizes,  because  it  binds  men 
together,  of  whatever  era  or  land,  in  the  common 
bonds  of  elemental  emotional  experience.  They  unite, 
in  sooth,  in  the  one  touch  of  Nature  that  makes  the 
whole  world  kin. 


217 


fiDoral  Obligation  of  literature 

AS   remarkable  a  plea  for  what  is  called  artistic 
freedom  in  literature  as  was  ever  made  in  Eng- 
lish is  to  be  found  in  these  lines  from  one  of  Chau- 
cer's "  Canterbury  Tales  ": 

And  therefore  every  gentle  wight  I  pray 
For  God's  love,  deraeth  not  that  I  say 
Of  evil  intent,  but  that  I  mote  rehearse 
Hir  tales  alle,  be  they  better  or  worse, 
Or  else  falsen  some  of  my  matere. 

In  other  words,  the  first  great  English  poet  declares 
himself  a  realist  who,  if  he  speaks  plainly  and  depicts 
an  unsavory  aspect  of  life,  is  but  setting  down  the 
actual,  painting  contemporary  manners  as  they  are. 
It  is  not  so  much  he  that  is  vulgar,  runs  the  argument, 
as  the  folk  he  would  faithfully  picture. 

This  presents  the  issue  fair  and  square:  is  it  art's 
business  to  reproduce  men  and  women  as  they  are, 
telling  everything  so  long  as  it  occurs;  or  should  it 
rather  select  the  material  and  re-compose  the  picture 
in  such  wise  as  to  breathe  upon  life  a  certain  added 
charm,  the  beauty  that  is  peculiar  to  art?  Of  old  this 
query  would  have  been  answered  quickly  in  favor  of 
the  idea  that  art  should  not  slavishly  copy  the  letter 
218 


Ube  /iDoral  ©bligation  of  ^Literature 

of  life,  but  strive  to  render  its  spirit.  But  in  our 
day,  criticism  has  tended  towards  the  other  view. 

Unquestionably,  Chaucer's  theory  would  be  right  if 
by  such  changes  life  were  not  the  better  represented. 
If,  for  example,  the  poem  or  fiction  or  drama,  in 
showing  us  men  and  women  in  this  world,  did  it  so 
partially  or  with  such  distortion  as  to  falsify  the  essen- 
tial traits  of  humanity,  it  would  be  a  disservice,  since 
the  reader  would  be  misled  concerning  life,  and  books, 
instead  of  helping  us  to  interpret  life's  meaning,  would 
be  a  sort  of  pleasing  pabulum,  sweet  to  the  taste  but 
bitter  in  the  belly. 

Nor  can  it  be  denied  that  much  so-called  idealistic 
literature  in  the  past  has  prettified  and  emasculated 
the  truth  out  of  all  semblance  of  reality:  the  dime 
novel,  in  its  hectic  exaggeration  of  adventure  and  ac- 
cident; the  love  story,  by  so  representing  each  sex  to 
the  other  as  to  hide  from  both  the  sane,  sweet  realities 
of  social  intercourse;  and  the  Utopian  books  which 
show,  not  a  possibly  better  state  of  existence  to  be  at- 
tained in  time,  but  an  impossible  planet  governed  by 
laws-  which  never  can  apply  to  this  particular  star  of 
the  solar  system.  The  reason  why  Plato's  "  Repub- 
lic "  and  More's  "  Utopia  "  are  of  permanent  impor- 
tance is  because  they  do  not  do  this,  but  suggest 
ideals  of  state  or  society  which  have  since  been  largely 
incorporated  into  practical  living. 

But  despite  this  abuse  of  fact,  it  were  quite  wrong 
to  pass  to  the  other  extreme  and  conclude  that  sound 
219 


3Ltttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 

art  implies  and  demands  a  literal  photograph  of  life. 
Rather,  as  Stevenson  finely  says  with  fiction  in  mind, 
art  exists  because  of  its  difference  from  life.  He 
means  that,  selecting  typical  things,  it  eliminates  the 
non-essentials,  the  myriad  confusing  and  insignificant 
details,  and  carefully  chooses  such  traits  as  properly 
may  stand  for  the  whole;  so  grading  the  human 
phenomena  as  to  give  us  a  sense  of  the  relative  values 
of  fact  and  flesh,  brain  and  soul.  First  in  time,  the 
natural  body,  then  the  spiritual  body;  but  in  impor- 
tance, first  the  spiritual  body:  that  is  the  law.  The 
value  of  the  flesh,  as  Browning  so  nobly  and  con- 
sistently taught,  lies  not  so  much  in  itself  as  in  its 
necessary  uses  for  the  purposes  of  the  spirit. 

To  illustrate:  suppose  a  novelist  desired  to  draw  a 
human  being  so  that  a  clear,  rounded  impression  of 
character  might  be  conveyed.  That  human  being  may 
be  supposed  to  wash  his  hands  three  times  a  day  for 
a  lifetime  of  seventy  years ;  or,  say,  in  round  numbers, 
more  than  thirty-one  thousand  times.  A  novelist  who 
dwelt  upon  this  fact,  and  threw  it  into  the  foreground, 
would  be  a  fool.  Why?  Because  this  reiterated  act 
would  have  no  human  significance,  would  not  reveal 
character  in  any  real  sense.  One  act  of  self-sacrifice, 
if  the  man  were  noble,  one  peculation,  if  he  were  weak, 
would  outweigh  in  revelatory  value  a  million  hand- 
washings,  worthy  as  the  instinct  or  habit  of  personal 
cleanliness  may  be  in  its  due  place.  The  illustration 
is  homely,  but  to  the  point.  The  literary  artist  must 

220 


/iDoral  <S>bit0atton  of  ^Literature 

select  and  graduate  human  acts,  moods,  and  thoughts 
on  an  ascending  scale  which  begins  in  protoplasm  and 
ends  in  the  spiritual.  To  deny  this  is  to  make  chaos 
out  of  psychology  and  repudiate  the  validity  of  the 
thinking  process,  ceasing  to  distinguish  between  the 
yelp  of  the  wolf  and  the  hosannah  of  the  redeemed. 

And  it  is  in  this  sense  that  moral  obligation  does 
exist  in  all  art  worthy  the  name.  The  writer  must  be 
held  sternly  accountable  for  his  representations,  nor  be 
allowed  to  blur  boundary  lines;  all  the  more  so  if  he 
possess  the  genius  of  a  Chaucer,  on  the  principle  of 
noblesse  oblige.  The  widespread  notion  that  it  is 
art's  affair  to  show  life,  and  that  there  its  responsi- 
bility ends, — "  a  fine  phrase  is  a  good  action,  I  know 
of  no  other  morality  in  fiction,"  cried  Zola,  an  apostle 
of  the  pestilential  opposite  view, —  is  unsound  in  logic 
and  vicious  in  result.  Nor,  broadly  speaking,  and 
pace  the  mighty  shade  of  Chaucer,  has  it  been  the 
way  of  the  world's  truly  great  and  abiding  art.  It 
is  a  theory  which,  from  Homer  to  Hawthorne,  has 
certainly  been  more  honored  in  the  breach  than  in  the 
observance. 

The  Chaucer  passage,  full  of  the  geniality  for  which 
that  master  of  English  expression  is  famed,  is,  after 
all,  intellectually  specious.  Certain  of  his  "  Canter- 
bury Tales,"  extenuate  them  as  we  may  because  of 
the  grosser  standards  of  the  fourteenth  century,  re- 
main as  blots  upon  a  very  great  writer's  name  and  fame, 
one  who  could  command  the  beautiful  tenderness  of 
221 


Olfttie  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  SLife 

the  Pyramus  and  Thisbe  tale,  the  lovely  pathos  of  that 
of  the  patient  Griselda,  or  the  clean,  honest  English 
fun  of  the  story  of  Chanticleer.  We  forgive  him  his 
grossness  in  view  of  the  way  he  could  and  did  soar 
above  the  muck  into  the  eternal  blue.  The  idea  that 
his  transcripts  of  common  life  and  coarse  people  could 
not  have  been  done  without  smut  is  nonsense,  and  any 
literary  theory  that  acts  on  such  an  assumption  mis- 
conceives the  mission  of  literature. 

As  Mr.  Howells  once  declared, —  and  he  never  said 
a  truer  thing, —  the  beast  in  man  is  slowly  dying  in 
life  and  should  be  allowed  to  die  in  letters.  To  poke 
fun  at  expurgations  and  sneer  at  the  process  of 
Bowdlerization  is  shallow  business  and  begs  the  ques- 
tion. An  author's  picture  of  humanity,  while  it 
should  face  facts,  of  course,  should  also  face  man  up- 
ward, since  that  is  his  deepest  significance;  he  is  go- 
ing that  way,  or  is  intended  to.  Biologically  speak- 
ing, he  once  went  on  all  fours;  when  he  stood  erect  on 
his  hind  legs,  not  mechanically,  like  a  trained  dog  or 
the  ape  who  is  man  in  the  making,  it  was  a  physical 
symbol  of  a  spiritual  truth :  man's  starry  aspiration,  his 
quest  for  things  that  are  above  earth. 


222 


Boohs 

"  A  H,  the  books  that  one  will  never  read  again," 
-*A.  cries  George  Gissing,  and  the  words  will  find 
a  responsive  echo  in  many  a  bookish  heart.  Life  is 
indeed  short,  and  literary  art,  in  these  days  of  the 
Jameses  and  the  Bennetts,  very  long;  so  that  the  well- 
meaning  reader  is  hard  put  to  it  to  make  the  acquaint- 
ance even  of  a  fraction  of  the  contemporary  literature 
supposed  to  be  worth  while,  let  alone  re-reading  what 
he  has  liked  in  the  past,  or  knows  to  be  of  such  fair 
fame  as  to  call  him  to  a  closer  friendship. 

It  is  a  temperate  statement  to  say  that,  if  we  all 
read  fifty  fine  books  and  then  read  them  again,  it 
would  do  more  for  us  in  the  way  of  culture  and  char- 
acter than  to  read  one  hundred  books  of  like  value. 
But  the  temptation  is,  under  the  modern  obsession  of 
haste,  to  cover  more  ground,  although  we  remember 
little  and  absorb  less.  A  first-class  piece  of  literature 
twice  read  will  be  more  than  doubly  appreciated ;  many 
a  virtue,  which  was  overlooked  at  the  first  contact,  is 
realized  to  personal  enrichment,  and  you  begin  to  see 
why  the  book  in  hand  is  called  a  classic,  a  masterpiece. 
Great  books,  then,  are  preeminently  for  a  re-reading. 
Their  full  greatness  is  only  thus  to  be  comprehended. 
223 


OLittle  Essays  in  Xtterature  an&  SLtfe 

Another  reason  for  the  re-reading  is  to  be  found  in 
the  undeniable  fact  that,  coming  to  the  experience  per- 
haps five  years  or  even  ten  later,  the  book  seems  to  have 
changed,  which  means  that  you  have.  You  know  a 
lot  about  life,  it  may  well  be,  that  you  did  not  know 
before.  You  have  grown  in  mental  stature,  and  so 
can  evaluate  excellencies  which  escaped  you  earlier; 
you  have  come  to  learn  somewhat  of  literary  art,  and 
can  judge  a  work  of  art  from  that  vantage  ground, 
whereas  before  you  were  estimating  it  rather  as  a 
piece  of  life,  a  human  product.  As  you  have  matured, 
themes  not  before  interesting  now  seem  paramount,  and 
you  see  that  at  first  you  did  scant  justice  to  the  range, 
depth,  and  beauty  of  the  creation.  Strictly  speaking, 
to  find  the  whole  significance  of  any  book  adjudged 
as  of  supreme  importance  by  the  world,  one  should 
read  it  at  intervals  of  a  few  years  from  the  school 
period  to  the  time  when  the  eye  closes  to  all  mortal 
activity, —  which  obviously  is  a  counsel  of  perfection, 
but  none  the  less  true  for  that.  I  have  seen  folk  look 
with  a  sort  of  tolerating  condescension  upon  a  fellow- 
mortal  who  quietly  declares  complete  ignorance  of 
some  startling  current  phenomenon  of  letters;  but 
often  you  will  find  that  quiet,  unpretentious  person 
carrying  on  a  steady  commerce  with  the  very  best 
literature  and  too  busy  and  happy  in  it  to  worry  about 
the  literary  nouveau  riche.  Let  us  not  be  so 
sure  that  he  has  the  worst  of  the  bargain. 

It  is  his  kind,  after  all,  which  makes  the  true  select 
224 


audience  for  Letters;  a  plebiscite  made  up  of  folk  who 
insist  on  a  personal  relation  with  a  book  and  will  not 
be  bullyragged  into  commerce  with  it,  let  the  majority 
say  what  it  will.  "  Are  we  to  be  suspicious  of  a 
book's  good  character,"  is  Lowell's  whimsical  protest, 
"  in  proportion  as  it  appeals  more  vividly  to  our  own 
private  consciousness  and  experience?'*  These  quiet 
appraisers  know  better. 

Gissing,  however,  in  the  essay  from  which  the 
sentence  was  quoted,  might  have  had  a  different 
thought  in  mind.  He  might  have  referred  to  an  ex- 
perience which  all  true  book  lovers  have  sooner  or 
later.  I  mean  the  late  reading  of  some  book  treasured 
in  childhood,  loved  through  a  fond  mist  of  memory, 
and,  alas,  at  the  mature  re-reading,  proving  a  sad 
disappointment:  the  magic  gone,  the  old  glamour  for- 
ever departed.  This  is  at  once  the  peril  and  delight 
of  early,  uncritical  contact  with  books.  One  drains 
the  glass  to  the  dregs,  and  it  is  all  sweet  and  palatable ; 
in  the  years  that  bring  discrimination,  one  sips,  judges, 
and  finds  the  vintage  no  longer  rare.  There  are  cer- 
tain famous  pieces  of  literature,  known  to  every  child 
whose  opportunities  have  been  genial,  which  those  chil- 
dren, now  grown-ups,  hesitate  ever  to  read  again. 
There  is  a  fear  that  the  cake  would  turn  dough,  a 
pleasant  ideal  be  lost. 

The  danger  of  disillusionment  is  so  considerable,  we 
are  so  anxious  to  preserve  the  affectionate  remembrance, 
that,  more  likely  than  not,  we  refrain  throughout  our 
225 


Xfttle  Essays  fn  literature  an&  Xtfe 

days  from  trying  "  The  Arabian  Nights,"  or 
"  Gulliver's  Travels,"  or  "  Grimm's  Fairy  Tales,"  or 
"  Don  Quixote."  I  had  the  good  fortune,  for  ex- 
ample, to  be  brought  up  on  Dickens,  and,  by  the 
reverend  age  of  fifteen,  his  characters,  Micawber  and 
Pecksniff,  the  Wellers  and  little  Dombey,  Barkis  and 
the  child  dressmaker,  Peggotty  and  Ham  and  little 
Em'ly,  Joe  Gargery  and  Smike  and  Sarah  Gamp, — 
these  and  a  multitude  more, —  had  become  dear  and 
familiar  companions.  Then  for  many  years  the  mas- 
ter of  Gadshill  was  laid  aside.  And  when,  at  last, 
"  Bleak  House  "  was  settled  on  for  a  re-reading  and 
new  valuation,  there  was  a  cold  fear  at  my  heart  that 
the  Dickens  of  the  unforgettable  past,  the  Dickens 
whose  folk  for  grave  or  gay  were  as  real  to  my  young 
imagination  as  those  of  my  own  household,  and  more 
real  than  almost  all  the  workaday  world,  would  be 
seen  for  the  caricatures  which  some  critics  had  been 
at  pains  to  tell  me  they  actually  were. 

It  was,  in  sooth,  a  perilous  moment,  that  first 
plunge  into  the  beautiful  dead  experience.  But  be- 
hold, the  master  lived  again,  better  than  ever,  I  found, 
greater  than  the  youngster  had  dreamed,  fuller  of 
meaning,  doing  noble  deeds  as  well  as  writing  noble 
words,  commanding  the  fount  of  tears  and  smiles, 
leaving  his  England  a  finer  place  than  he  found  it.  I 
had  taken  the  risk,  and  glorious  had  been  the  issue. 
The  jaded  taster  of  books,  with  his  Dickens  more 
precious  than  ever,  knew  now  that  the  mighty  Vic- 
226 


torian  story-teller  was  to  be  a  friend  and  helper  all 
the  way  along  the  life-road,  and  not  merely  the  tem- 
porary friend  of  childhood. 

On  the  whole,  it  is  probable  that  a  real  classic,  the 
kind  of  book  that  has  successfully  evaded  the  destruc- 
tive attacks  of  time,  will  stand  this  test  of  re-reading. 
There  are  personal  exceptions,  no  doubt,  such  changes 
of  test  and  taste  —  not  by  any  means  always  trust- 
worthy —  which  result  in  dislike  or  indifference  where 
of  yore  was  vehement  regard,  even  supine  adoration. 
But  as  a  generalization,  you  can  trust  the  great  book, 
and  return  to  it  with  the  confidence  that  it  will  re- 
ward the  effort  and  perhaps  give  you  a  delightful  sur- 
prise. "  Little  Women,"  beloved  as  a  boy  by  me, — 
with  some  shame  when  I  heard  that  it  was  called  "  a 
girl's  book," — was  re-read  late  in  life  with  the  same 
result:  tears  came,  joy  reawakened  wonder  that  the 
notion  should  have  got  abroad  that  such  a  thing  was 
not  for  all  ages  and  both  sexes! 

Ths  moral  of  it  all  is:  re-read  the  big,  beautiful 
books,  nor  put  it  off  on  the  plea  of  lack  of  time,  or 
fear  of  disillusionment,  or  any  other  silly  reason. 
Don't  allow  yourself  to  make  the  mistake  implied  in 
Gissing's  final  words :  "  Books  gentle  and  quieting ; 
books  noble  and  inspiring;  books  that  well  merit  to  be 
pored  over,  not  once  but  many  a  time.  Yet  never 
again  shall  I  hold  them  in  my  hand;  the  years  fly 
too  quickly,  and  are  too  few.  Perhaps  when  I  lie  wait- 
ing for  the  end,  some  of  these  lost  books  will  come 
227 


Xtttle  Bssags  in  literature  an&  OLife 

into  my  wandering  thoughts,  and  I  shall  remember 
them  as  friends  to  whom  I  owed  a  kindness, —  friends 
passed  upon  the  way.  What  regret  in  that  last  fare- 
well!" 


228 


Sbaw'e  Wts&om 

MRS.  SHAW  has  edited  a  pretty  volume  of  the 
selected  sayings  of  her  husband,  George 
Bernard  Shaw,  under  the  title,  "  The  Wisdom  of 
Bernard  Shaw."  The  volume  is  made  up  of  excerpts 
from  his  writings,  ranging  in  length  from  a  brief  para- 
graph to  essays  of  several  pages.  The  book  is  preface- 
less,  perhaps  because  the  author's  own  prefaces  tend 
to  be  voluminous,  and  the  aim  is  to  present  the 
dramatist  thinker  as  a  maker  of  pensees  —  the  de- 
tached, scintillating  nuggets  of  thought  in  which  some 
theme  is  so  touched  and  ornamented  as  to  stimulate 
and  charm  the  reader. 

Such  a  collection  of  sayings  in  one  respect  does 
Shaw  an  injustice,  representative  though  it  is.  It 
draws  attention  to  his  power  of  epigram  and  aphorism 
at  the  expense  of  his  quality  for  sustained  and  cogent 
argumentation,  an  aspect  of  his  genius  the  world  as 
yet  is  rather  loath  to  recognize,  yet  very  necessary  to 
a  comprehension  of  this  unique  son  of  Ireland.  In 
fact,  Shaw's  unity  of  teaching,  the  singleness  of  pur- 
pose and  theory  which  runs  through  the  twenty-odd 
plays  he  has  written,  as  well  as  through  the  extra-dra- 
matic critical  work,  has  been  largely  lost  sight  of  in 
229 


Xittie  JBssaB  tn  ^literature  an&  Slife 


the  enjoyment  of  his  gift  as  phrasemaker  and  pur- 
veyor of  paradox. 

With  this  understood,  however,  the  present  book  is 
welcome,  and  those  who  read  with  the  habit  of  rumina- 
tion will  not  fail  to  see  that  there  is  more  than  the 
happy  turn  and  the  startling  statement  in  these  pages; 
that  here,  on  the  contrary,  is  a  very  earnest  mind  speak- 
ing with  the  force  of  conviction  concerning  matters 
of  vital  interest  to  him,  and  with  the  desire  to  persuade 
others.  To  go  further,  I  incline  to  think  that  this 
little  volume  of  close-packed  thought  will  place  the 
author  with  the  writers  of  pensees  who  have  perma- 
nent value  among  the  literary  masters:  Pascal, 
Amiel,  La  Rochefoucauld,  —  one  thinks  of  the 
Frenchmen  first,  —  Heine,  Turgenef,  and  others  of  the 
elect. 

Here  is  that  union  of  worthy  thought  with  expres- 
sion that  is  preservative  which  one  has  come  to  as- 
sociate with  this  class  of  writers;  above  all,  the  con- 
cision and  precision  which  add  elegance  to  strength, 
and  result  in  that  effect  of  much  in  little  which  makes 
the  sentence,  the  passage,  the  page  memorable.  Take 
this  specimen,  brief,  pregnant,  brilliant,  chosen  from 
"Man  and  Superman":  "When  a  man  wants  to 
murder  a  tiger  he  calls  it  sport  ;  when  the  tiger  wants 
to  murder  him,  he  calls  it  ferocity.  The  distinction 
between  Crime  and  Justice  is  no  greater." 

Or  again,  this  from  "  The  Doctor's  Dilemma,"  an 
excellent  example  of  suggestive  thought  so  happily 
230 


Sbaw's 

couched  in  language  as  to  make  its  meaning  the  more 
arresting :  "  What  is  called  Science  has  always  pur- 
sued the  Elixir  of  Life  and  the  Philosopher's  Stone, 
and  is  just  as  busy  after  them  to-day  as  ever  it  was  in 
the  days  of  Paracelsus.  We  call  them  by  different 
names:  Immunization  or  Radiology  or  what  not;  but 
the  dreams  which  lure  us  into  the  adventures  from 
which  we  learn  are  always  at  bottom  the  same." 

One  of  the  things  a  careful  perusal  of  the  little  vol- 
ume will  bring  out  is  that  Shaw  is  not  a  writer  who 
gets  his  hearing  by  a  mere  manipulation  of  words  and 
the  paradoxical  reversion  of  the  expected:  what  Oscar 
Wilde  is  often  guilty  of,  and  Chesterton,  too.  Shaw's 
impression  is  made  by  more  than  surface  scintillations; 
there  is  solid  stuff  beneath  the  glitter  of  speech  or 
pyrotechnics  of  method. 

This  comes  back  to  my  remarj:  that  the  side  of  Shaw 
that  needs  attention  and  emphasis  is  not  the  side  which 
exhibits  him  as  phrasemaker  and  paradoxer,  the  side  in 
full  evidence  in  the  selections  making  up  the  present 
volume.  The  Shaw  still  little  known,  or  at  least  less 
known,  is  the  thinker  of  a  definite  creed,  the  serious 
social  student,  the  believer  in  life  as  a  splendid,  mystic 
undertaking  which  each  is  a  part  of  and  must  assist  by 
the  fullest  and  freest  expression  of  individuality.  Here 
is  Shaw  the  socialist,  the  crier-up  of  the  life  force,  the 
man  with  faith  in  God's  plan  and  man's  destiny. 
Social  passion,  meaning  the  burning  desire  to  do  one's 
share  for  the  betterment  of  society,  especially  in  its 
231 


Xtttle  Essays  tn  Xfterature  an&  SLtfe 

impoverished    and    wretched    members,    irradiates    all 
Shaw's  work. 

So  far  from  having  no  consecutive  purpose  through- 
out his  writings,  no  author  has  ever  hammered  with 
Thor  strokes  at  one  view  for  a  quarter  century  more 
persistently.  He  put  an  antic  disposition  on  wittingly 
because,  as  he  told  us,  he  wished  to  attract  attention  to 
his  wares,  and  knew  that  the  use  of  the  cart  and  the 
trumpet  was  the  way  to  do  it.  But  it  is  a  shallow  and 
foolish  deduction  from  this  to  suppose  him  a  mounte- 
bank, because  he  chose  the  mountebank  methods  to 
bring,  not  to  the  specialist  but  to  the  general  public, 
his  advanced  notions  on  society.  Twenty  or  more 
years  ago,  these  notions  looked  very  much  more  alarm- 
ing than  they  do  now.  Shaw  was  by  so  much  ahead 
of  his  age,  which  has  now  caught  up  with  him,  and 
people  are  fast  getting  wonted  to  talk  about  eugenics 
and  pensioning  mothers  and  municipalizing  doctors  and 
many  another  Shaw  vagary  which  turns  out  to  be 
sound  modern  thinking. 

Thus  the  unified  and  constructive  philosophy  which 
underlies  this  writer's  dramatic  works  and  his  ample 
critical  books,  whether  on  nominal  literary  themes, 
like  "  The  Quintessence  of  Ibsen,"  or  purely  scientific 
and  sociological,  as  in  the  Fabian  Essays,  must  be 
ascertained  by  that  patient  reading  which  comparatively 
few  as  yet  find  time  or  inclination  to  devote  to  Shaw. 
Meanwhile,  the  many  can  enjoy  his  "  wisdom  '*  as  it 
is  revealed  in  his  wife's  selections. 
232 


Sbaw's  Misfcom 

Shaw  is  not  of  the  class  of  authors  who  say  a  thing 
in  a  striking  way  which  you,  poor  wordless  one,  have 
long  felt  and  wished  to  say,  but  being  dumb,  needed  a 
spokesman  to  say  it  for  you.  We  all  know  the  pleas- 
ure in  a  writer  based  on  the  fact  that  he  thinks  as  we 
do  and  can  convey  the  agreement  in  felicitous  terms. 
Shaw,  quite  otherwise,  awakens,  as  likely  as  not,  the 
most  violent  disagreement:  you  almost  talk  out  loud 
in  reply  to  him  as  his  sentences  come  along  and  knock 
you  down  like  a  policeman's  club.  He  arrests  you,  to 
carry  out  the  figure,  when  you  have  not  broken  the 
peace  (you  believe),  and  hales  you  up  to  judgment  on 
the  charge  of  not  being  mentally  alert. 

He  shocks,  challenges,  manhandles  your  mind,  and 
this  treatment,  while  it  may  be  as  unpleasant  as  mas- 
sage to  one  suffering  from  rheumatism,  is  nevertheless 
a  mighty  wholesome  thing  in  the  way  of  a  shake-up, 
resulting  in  a  livelier  circulation  and  a  certain  tonic 
effect  on  the  sluggish  intellect.  In  the  end,  you  are 
grateful  to  one  who  has  forced  you  to  be  alive,  recon- 
sider your  position,  look  at  the  other  side  of  the  ques- 
tion and  be  sure  that  what  you  called  your  belief  was 
not  merely  a  state  of  mental  inertia. 


233 


Boofcs  an&  flDen 

CHAUCER,  bookish  though  he  was,  loved  Dame 
Nature  and,  when  spring  came,  would  cry: 
"  Farewell,  my  books  and  my  devotion ! "  Then 
would  he  go  forth  into  the  open,  to  breathe  the  de- 
licious air  and  rejoice  with  all  the  dear  growing  things. 
This  line  of  his  is  one  of  many  similar  references  to 
the  contrast  between  books  and  man,  books  and  Na- 
ture, books  and  life,  not  only  found  in  literature  itself, 
but  heard  daily  on  the  lips  of  mortals. 

Strange  it  is,  nevertheless,  and  no  less  unfortunate 
than  strange,  that  there  has  arisen  in  men's  minds  this 
conception  of  literature  as  separate  from  life,  even  in 
a  way  antagonistic  to  it.  Hence  it  comes  that  the  way- 
faring man  goes  by  on  the  other  side  when  a  book 
rather  than  a  fellow-man  is  offered  him;  he  forgets 
that,  in  Milton's  fine  saying,  "  a  good  book  is  the 
precious  life  blood  of  a  master  spirit,  embalmed  and 
treasured  up  to  a  life  beyond  life."  The  trouble  came 
in  setting  down  literature  upon  the  printed  page. 
Gradually  crept  in  a  seeming  distinction  between  hu- 
man beings,  whose  talk  made  letters,  and  the  talk  thus 
stereotyped  in  books. 

Yet  all  literature  in  its  origins,  study  its  rise  and  de- 
234 


Books  anfc  flfcen 

velopment  in  what  nation  you  will,  is  simply  eloquent 
and  gifted  folk  talking  of  the  world  they  live  in.  The 
talk  was  written  down  in  manuscript  before  the  age  of 
printing,  for  the  purpose  of  transmission;  later,  in  the 
fifteenth  century,  printing  was  invented  and  a  far 
wider  circulation  became  possible.  By  its  aid,  litera- 
ture could  be  sent  broadly  over  the  face  of  the  earth 
and  handed  down  to  after  time,  thus  perpetuating  the 
inspired  words  of  the  writer  long  after  he  had  passed 
away  in  the  flesh.  The  incalculable  benefits  accruing 
from  this  preservation  of  literature  are  apparent;  in- 
deed, only  thus  could  literature  have  become  the  in- 
heritor of  past  renown  and  one  of  the  chief  glories  of 
a  civilized  people,  a  thesaurus  wherein  could  be  found, 
like  the  massed  jewels  in  a  treasure  chest,  the  stored- 
up  wisdom,  eloquence  and  beauty  of  which  the  race  is 
capable. 

But  along  with  this  advantage  went  an  injury,  a 
grave  one:  the  artificial  division  we  speak  of,  between 
life  and  literature.  In  primitive  times,  let  it  be  said 
again,  literature  was  life  reflected  in  the  tones,  the 
gestures  and  the  burning  words  of  men  of  genius, — 
and  of  women  as  well,  when  a  Sappho  lived  and  sung. 
The  epic  poem,  the  ballad  and  the  lyric  were  narratives 
short  or  long,  told  in  verse,  because  the  measured 
language  of  verse  was  more  musical  and  better  remem- 
bered than  that  of  prose.  Early  man,  in  literature, 
uttered  poetry  before  prose.  The  lyric  was  a  song- 
poem  where  the  minstrel,  with  instrument  in  hand, 
235 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 


chanted  to  the  literal  accompaniment  of  the  strings. 
Drama  was  spoken  in  some  public  place,  so  was  ora- 
tory; the  novel  in  the  modern  sense  had  not  been 
born  ;  recited  narrative,  whether  in  prose  or  verse,  took 
its  place;  all  was  spoken  or  sung,  the  viva  voce  out- 
pourings closely  associated  with  the  persons  themselves, 
as  they  stood  before  their  fellow-men,  produced  in 
this  simple,  forthright,  democratic  way,  the  literature 
of  the  world.  "  In  the  beginning  was  the  word  "  is 
as  true  in  literature  as  in  religion;  the  word  being 
that  which  comes  hot  from  the  heart  and  living  to 
the  lips  of  human  beings  who  have  somewhat  to  say 
which  the  world  would  willingly  hear. 

And  yet,  because  all  this  became  gradually  forgotten, 
our  age  has  set  up  a  false  and  foolish  distinction  be- 
tween the  spoken  and  written  word.  Thousands  read 
poetry,  which  is  in  reality  song,  without  a  thought  of 
reading  it  aloud  themselves;  they  even  resent  hearing 
another  read  it.  Drama,  for  the  reason  that  it  can 
be  spoken  as  well  as  read,  lies  under  the  sad  imputa- 
tion of  being  unliterary,  or  but  half-literary,  and 
purists  go  so  far  as  to  prefer  plays  in  book  form  to 
plays  enacted,  as  all  plays  should  be,  upon  the  very 
stage.  Pale-faced,  fiery-eyed  enthusiasts  gather  in  dim- 
lit  drawing-rooms  and  indulge  in  secret  rites  which  the 
unregenerate  outside  understand  to  be  occult  and 
mystic  —  the  sacred  word  "  literature  "  being  a  shib- 
boleth which  alone  passes  the  devotee  into  the  pene- 
tralia of  the  mystery.  And  we  behold  the  climactic 

236 


Boofes  anfc 

absurdity  of  school  children  brought  to  make  a  sharp 
distinction  between  books  and  men,  and  pedagogues  la- 
menting the  wane  of  literary  studies,  with  the  increase 
of  more  practical  aims  and  ambitions.  As  if  books, 
properly  used,  were  not  the  very  tools  of  life,  both 
for  instruction  and  inspiration. 

You  regard  it  as  practical  to  consult  a  lawyer  or 
physician  in  respect  of  some  matter  within  the  domain 
of  his  special  knowledge.  Why  is  it  less  practical  to 
consult  those  same  men  in  the  words  they  have  written 
down  in  a  book?  Nor  would  it  be  deemed  bookish  to 
listen  to  the  thrilling  sermon  of  a  vital  preacher,  yet 
were  a  book  of  his  sermons  in  hand,  the  word  of 
criticism  might  be  heard. 

The  same  argument  is  quite  as  cogent  when  it  is  ap- 
plied to  polite  letters  in  such  forms  as  essay,  fiction,  po- 
etry and  the  drama.  Such  books  give  us  the  wisdom, 
the  music  and  imagination,  the  tenderness  and  fun 
and  noble  indignation  which  are  in  men,  without  the 
waste  time  of  their  stupidity,  the  friction  of  their  per- 
sonalities, or  the  disillusion  of  their  evil-doing.  You 
become  an  Academe  with  Plato,  stand  upon  some 
Pisgah  Mount  with  Moses,  walk  with  Dante  and 
Virgil  through  the  underworld  and  learn  the  fates  of 
the  Florentines ;  sail  the  broad  seas  with  Homer,  watch 
with  Shakspere  the  breaking  of  mighty  Othello's  heart, 
listen  to  Bacon's  sententious  melody,  each  sentence  a 
clean-cut  gem,  and  stretch  out  your  hands  to  pluck 
the  sun-kissed  flowers  in  the  summer  mead  whereof 
237 


Xittie  JEssa^s  in  Xttemure  anfc  %tfc 

Keats  sings.  Do  you  think  for  a  moment  that  literal 
converse  with  them  all,  these  masters  of  words,  makers 
of  music,  weavers  of  thought  that  has  changed  the 
world  and  made  life  richer  and  sweeter,  would  have 
been  so  well  worth  while  as  contact  with  them  in  this 
deeper  way  through  the  words  which  are  their  im- 
perishable legacy  to  all  the  children  of  men  ?  To  state 
the  question  is  to  air  its  folly. 

No,  let  us  have  done  with  this  altogether  unfruitful 
mistake.  It  is  bad  for  education,  in  that  it  establishes 
an  unwarrantable  prejudice  against  so-called  book  cul- 
ture on  the  part  of  the  young,  who  really  are  ripe  and 
ready  for  literature  when  it  is  sensibly  offered.  It  cur- 
tails the  potent  influence  of  literature  over  the  earth, 
by  suggesting  pseudo  tests  and  erroneous  standards  for 
its  recognition.  And,  saddest  of  all,  it  keeps  many  of 
mankind  away  from  the  splendid  tonic  of  intercourse 
with  these  chosen  blithe  spirits  who  have  made  our 
great  literature,  as  if  they  spoke  to  the  few,  instead  of 
to  all  with  ears  to  hear,  and  were  cloistered  away  from 
the  bosom  interests  of  the  race.  Whereas,  it  is  their 
distinction  that  they  know  life  at  large  and  speak  for 
us  all. 


ttbe  Bible  in  tbe  Schools 

\  TTENTION  has  been  called  of  late  to  the  mat- 
-*JL  ter  of  the  Bible  in  the  public  schools.  Interest 
has  been  aroused  by  the  recent  action  of  the  Pennsyl- 
vania legislature,  which  passed  a  law  making  it 
obligatory  for  every  teacher  in  the  State  to  read  daily 
to  the  pupils  for  a  few  minutes  from  the  Scriptures. 

In  these  days  of  -appreciation  of  the  cultural  value 
of  the  Book  it  is  not  eccentric  to  make  the  point  that 
this  installation  of  the  Bible  in  the  schools  is  entirely 
advisable;  and  more,  it  is  likely  to  be  adopted  all  over 
the  United  States  in  course  of  time.  The  Bible,  once 
read  in  the  school  as  a  matter  of  course,  has  been  al- 
most totally  banished  from  our  public  school  system  be- 
cause of  old  it  has  been  used  in  a  way  to  give  color  to 
criticism:  that  is,  for  sectarian  purpose  or  with  theo- 
logical bias ;  or  if  it  has  not  been  so  used  —  which  may 
well  be  doubted  —  the  fear  that  it  would  be  has  led 
to  its  discreet  withdrawal  from  any  part  in  the  daily 
exercises. 

Those  of  us,  however,  who  are  of  middle  age  or 

more  can  well  recall  that  a  generation  ago  reading 

from  the  Scriptures  was  a  regular  part  of  the  daily 

routine  in  the  grammar  and  high  school.     The  change 

239 


OLittie  Bssa^s  in  Xitetature  an&  %ife 


all  over  the  Union  has  been  marked  in  this  re- 
spect. 

Of  course,  the  best  argument  for  the  restoration  of 
the  Bible  in  the  schools  is  based  upon  the  undeniable 
fact  that  the  reading  of  properly  selected  passages, 
passages  chosen  from  the  splendid  wisdom  and  poetry 
of  a  collection  that  is  confessedly  the  proudest  orna- 
ment of  our  English  literature,  is  in  the  deepest  sense 
educational.  It  stimulates  in  the  hearer  the  feeling 
for  the  beauty  of  upright  conduct  and  breeds  those 
ethical  ideals  which  are  the  safeguard  of  a  nation  and 
the  very  foundation  for  that  character  building  which 
should  be  education's  highest  aim. 

It  is  terribly  short-sighted  to  exclude  or  neglect  a 
book  that  is  capable  of  this  influence,  on  the  entirely 
erroneous  supposition  that  it  will  be  and  must  be  used 
in  the  interests  of  propagandism  of  one  sort  or  the 
other.  A  committee,  representing  the  best  thought  of 
the  community,  and  of  varied  attitude  as  to  religious 
conviction,  can  be  named  to  make  the  selections,  if  it 
be  deemed  dangerous  to  leave  it  to  the  option  of  the 
individual  teacher;  and  modern  men  and  women,  of 
whatever  faith,  are  fast  becoming  a  unit  in  the  ac- 
knowledgment of  the  broad  spiritual  inspiration  to  be 
found  in  the  Book  of  Books.  To  avoid  possible 
offense,  the  excerpts  can  be  drawn  exclusively  from  the 
Old  Testament,  if  necessary.  The  finest  portions  of 
the  Psalms,  Proverbs,  Prophets,  and  narrative  books, 
drawn  upon  in  this  way,  would  have  an  effect  simply 
240 


Bible  in  tbe  Scbools 

incalculable,  when  listened  to  morning  after  morn- 
ing through  the  school  year.  Especially  is  this  true 
when  both  skill  and  reverence  unite  to  make  the  read- 
ing what  it  should  be,  for  perfunctory  coldness  can 
nullify  the  effect. 

There  is  an  additional  argument  for  this  use  of  the 
Bible  in  the  schools  of  America  at  the  present  time. 
The  tendency  of  our  modern  educational  system  has  been 
markedly  in  the  direction  of  specialization  and  of  the 
multiplying  of  studies,  and  those  studies,  broadly  speak- 
ing, of  a  more  utilitarian  nature,  or  at  least  applied 
to  some  practical,  immediate  result.  Hence,  it  has  be- 
come increasingly  hard  for  the  young  student  to  keep 
his  proper  sense  of  proportion  and  to  realize  that, 
while  all  knowledge  is  good,  there  must  be  some  unify- 
ing principle  to  bind  together  the  many  and  seemingly 
unrelated  subjects,  in  the  aim  to  produce  sound  and 
useful  citizenship.  This  means  turning  out  from  our 
educational  institutions  people  of  self-respect  and  ca- 
pacity, with  an  all-round  comprehension  of  life  and 
solidly  grounded  in  the  laws  of  life. 

Who  that  has  watched  with  a  thoughtful  eye  the 
educational  trend  of  our  particular  generation  can 
deny  that,  because  of  this  danger  of  losing  the  whole 
in  the  parts,  it  is  the  more  imperative  not  to  eliminate 
from  the  regular  school  training  an  influence  which  is 
cultural  as  opposed  to  the  utilitarian,  and  spiritual  as 
opposed  to  the  merely  intellectual?  To  place  the 
spiritual,  the  influence  that  makes  for  character,  where 
241 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^literature  a^  OLife 

it  belongs,  in  the  center  of  a  rightly  ordered  scheme 
of  study,  is  to  establish  the  right  orientation.  Con- 
tact with  the  literature  of  the  Scriptures  furnishes  just 
that  discipline,  and  the  land  that  ignores  it  is  woe- 
fully wrong  in  its  educational  ideal  and  method. 

As  the  Bible  becomes  more  widely  recognized  as  a 
book  of  power  and  beauty,  and  less  and  less  as  an 
autocratic  repository  of  theology,  it  will  be  ever  more 
apparent  that  we  shut  it  out  of  our  schools  at  the  na- 
tion's peril.  The  Bible  in  education  is  needed  as  a 
unique  presentation  of  the  spiritual  growth  of  a  race, 
seen  in  its  towering  personalities,  the  story  standing 
for  the  whole  race  of  man  in  its  evolution  to  its  higher 
capacities.  Nowhere  else  is  there  a  clearer  and  more 
inspiring  expression  of  the  life  which  is  of  the  heart 
and  soul,  the  life  that  transcends  the  flesh  and  is  as 
much  above  brain  as  brain  is  above  brawn. 

Think  of  the  myriad  young  folk  of  the  land  harken- 
ing  of  a  morning,  before  turning  to  their  several  tasks, 
to  the  tenderest  of  the  Psalms,  "  The  Lord  is  my  Shep- 
herd," or  to  the  magnificent  nature  chant,  "  The 
Heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God,"  or  to  the  everlast- 
ing loveliness  of  Ruth's  utterance,  "  Intreat  me  not  to 
leave  thee,  or  to  return  from  following  after  thee,"  or 
to  the  solemn  and  splendid  words  of  David's  lament, 
"  Saul  and  Jonathan  were  lovely  and  pleasant  in  their 
lives,  and  in  their  death  they  were  not  divided !  " 
Who  can  question  the  value  and  need  of  such  an  open- 
ing of  the  busy  day,  the  activities  of  which  to  so  great 
242 


ZTbe  Bible  in  tbe  Scboois 

a  degree  draw  the  mind  away  from  such  thoughts  and 
feelings  ? 

No  definition  of  the  word  "  education  "  is  broad  and 
right  which  does  not  accept  as  central  and  of  su- 
preme importance  therein  the  influence  of  such  litera- 
ture as  this  upon  human  beings,  and  most  of  all  upon 
the  young  who  are  being  trained  in  that  formative 
period  when  their  minds  are  most  open  to  its  recep- 
tion. It  is  impossible  for  the  well-wisher  of  his  coun- 
try not  to  feel  some  uneasiness  at  any  sign  that  this 
matter  of  fundamental  importance  is  ignored  or 
minimized  or,  at  any  rate,  its  recognition  not  incor- 
porated in  action. 

Mrs.  Houghton,  the  principal  of  the  Knox  School 
for  Girls  at  Tarrytown,  New  York,  declares  that  the 
modern  school  must  supply  the  greater  part  of  the 
spiritual  and  ethical  training  which  girls  of  another 
day  got  in  the  home  and  church.  And  Mr.  Hartman, 
of  the  Franklin  and  Marshall  Academy,  of  Lancaster, 
Pennsylvania,  pleads  for  the  importance  of  the  boy's 
early  religious  education  at  home,  to  help  the  school 
in  its  work.  The  wise  cooperation  of  home  and 
school  is  desirable.  Let  the  people  see  to  it  that  the 
school  does  its  duty. 


243 


2>tfflkult?  of  {translation 

THE  best  piece  of  translation  into  English  ever 
made  is  probably  Edward  Fitzgerald's  "  Ru- 
baiyat "  of  Omar  Khayyam,  and  that  is  not  a  transla- 
tion at  all.  The  "  Rubaiyat,"  more  accurately  de- 
scribed, is  a  free  handling  of  certain  ideas  found  in 
the  Persian  poet  by  the  eccentric  Victorian  recluse. 
The  original  was  but  the  starting-point  from  which 
the  Englishman  set  out  to  express  his  own  strongly  in- 
dividual views  about  life  and  love,  death,  eternity,  and 
the  soul's  destiny.  The  carpe  diem  sentiment  of  the 
"  Rubaiyat "  happened  to  strike  a  deeply  responsive 
chord  in  the  breast  of  the  nineteenth  century  writer 
and  thinker;  the  rest  followed.  Not  only  was  Omar's 
philosophy  of  "  eat,  drink  and  to-morrow  we  die " 
sympathetic  to  "  dear  old  Fitz,"  as  Thackeray  affec- 
tionately styled  him,  but  the  poem  voiced  the  spiritual 
mood  of  the  moment  in  England  and  in  the  Occident 
in  general. 

In  the  middle  of  the  last  century  philosophic  and 
spiritual  ideals  were  fast  changing  under  the  impulse  of 
the  new  scientific  thought.  Old  beliefs  were  given  up 
or  else  suffered  extraordinary  changes.  Many  a  boat, 
torn  from  the  traditional  moorings,  was  adrift  upon  a 
244 


H>ffRcult£  of  translation 

wide  sea  of  speculation,  doubt,  even  despair.  Tenny- 
son's "  In  Memoriam  "  shows  how  a  reverential  mind, 
bred  in  the  Christian  faith,  had  to  undergo  this  in- 
tellectual anguish  before  rinding  firm  ground..  Ar- 
nold's agnosticism,  with  its  profoundly  sad  but  beauti- 
ful minor  note,  was  an  expression  of  the  same  unrest. 
Readjustment  was  to  come  in  time,  as  our  own  age 
testifies ;  but  for  a  while  all  was  welter,  uncertainty  and 
alarm. 

And  so,  in  Fitzgerald's  case,  the  man  and  his  time  were 
ripe  to  seize  upon  an  interpretation  out  of  the  Orient, 
and  make  it  voice  all  this  occidental  agitation.  The 
doctrine  that  flowers  and  fair  faces  alike  end  in  death, 
that  therefore  one  should  snatch  the  fleeting  pleasure 
since  it  alone  is  sure,  was  the  intellectual  pose  or  the 
soul-wrung  conviction  of  the  moment.  It  is  summed 
up  in  those  melodious  and  memorable  lines: 

Come,  fill  the  Cup,  and  in  the  fire  of  spring 
Your  winter-garment  of  Repentance  fling: 
The  Bird  of  time  has  but  a  little  way 
To  flutter,  and  the  Bird  is  on  the  wing. 

Using,  therefore,  an  entirely  different  measure  from 
the  Persian,  and  choosing  such  parts  of  the  poem  (a 
mere  fraction  of  it)  as  should  best  convey  the  teach- 
ing he  wished  to  present,  Fitzgerald,  with  his  wonder- 
ful gift  for  the  felicitous  word,  the  music  that  lingers 
in  the  ear,  wrought  what  was  practically  a  great  English 
poem  with  an  Eastern  motive. 

All  of  this  leads  us  to  the  thought  that  there  is  no 
245 


Xittie  Essays  in  literature  anfc  %ife 

such  thing  as  a  translation  of  a  genuine  piece  of  litera- 
ture, particularly  of  a  poem,  so  as  to  preserve  it  intact, 
because  the  form  of  the  original  is  of  its  very  essence, 
soul  of  its  soul,  and  that  form  cannot  be  lifted  over 
from  one  tongue  to  another.  Either  you  must  be 
literal,  give  the  meaning,  which  is  to  dissect  a  rose ;  or, 
departing  frankly,  like  Fitzgerald,  from  any  slavish 
copy,  you  must  make  another  true  poem. 

Sidney  Lanier,  who  was  eminently  successful  in  his 
translations  (to  give  them  the  usual  name),  spoke  of 
the  impossibility  of  doing  anything  else,  and  no  one 
was  more  capable  than  he  of  transferring  foreign  ma- 
terial to  the  mother  speech.  Of  the  many  English 
renderings  of  Heine's  exquisite  "  Du  bist  wie  eine 
Blume,"  none  is  happier  than  that  by  Emma  Lazarus, 
the  gifted  Jewish  poet;  yet  one  who  reads  German 
cannot  but  feel  that  even  she  fails  to  get  the  inimitable 
simplicity  and  pathos  of  the  original.  But  try  to  bet- 
ter it  yourself,  as  I  once  did  during  a  week  of  barren 
effort,  and  you  will  be  likely  to  conclude  that  the  task 
is  beyond  accomplishment,  that  Miss  Lazarus  has  done 
as  well  as  can  be  done.  No,  imitation  and  dissection 
are  not  creation,  and  never  will  be. 

This  explains  why  the  best  modern  translating  from 
the  classics  or  the  standard  poetry  of  Europe  inclines 
more  and  more  nowadays  to  the  substitution  of  good, 
honest  prose,  recognizing  that  the  disparity  between 
tongues  and  the  inherent  nature  of  form  make  a  closer 
transference  impractical.  It  was  not  so  in  former  days, 
246 


2>itKcult£  ot*  ^Translation 

when  doughty  Chapman  turned  Homer  into  sweeping 
fourteen-syllable  lines,  or  Pope  made  the  Greek  urban 
in  the  neat  rhyming  couplets  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Now,  however,  most  of  us  prefer  the  noble  Butcher- 
Lang  version,  the  rhythmic  prose  sentences  of  which 
better  convey  an  idea  of  the  ocean  surge  of  the  original 
epic.  The  splendid  prose  translation  of  Dante  by 
Charles  Eliot  Norton  is  a  further  illustration  of  the 
same  critical  tendency.  Better  good  prose,  which 
avowedly  abandons  the  unattainable,  than  any  substi- 
tute in  verse,  which,  however  skilful  and  enjoyable, 
does  not  reproduce  either  for  the  ear  or  the  taste 
the  peculiar,  home-bred  charm  of  what  is  native  and 
a  matter  of  intuition  to  the  creator  of  the  master- 
piece. 

It  must  be  understood  that  when  the  claim  is  made 
that  form  is  part  of  the  life-principle  of  a  composition, 
the  view  is  implicit  that  form  is  not  a  trick,  a  garment 
put  on  and  taken  off  at  will,  something  superimposed 
from  without.  On  the  contrary,  form  as  thus  con- 
ceived is  an  integral  part  of  personality;  a  poem,  for 
instance,  springs  into  being,  compact  of  music,  metaphor 
and  imagination,  all  so  inextricably  intertwined  that 
they  can  no  more  be  dissevered  than  can  the  human 
body  and  spirit  without  the  perishing  of  the  whole  man. 
There  is  a  movement,  a  melody,  in  the  Divine  Comedy 
of  the  mightiest  poet  of  Italy  which  never  has  nor  can 
be  transposed  to  English,  because  our  language  from  its 
structure  does  not  admit  of  the  effects  secured  by  the 
247 


Xittle  Essays  In  ^Literature  ant)  SLife 

continual  soft,  lingering  loveliness  of  the  feminine  end- 
ings in  which  Italian  is  so  rich. 

In  the  same  way,  to  turn  the  grand  harmonies,  the 
free,  virile  music  of  the  biblical  poetry  into  the  more 
confined  limits  of  form  common  to  English  verse  is  to 
cramp,  weaken  and  make  impotent  one  of  the  unique 
poetic  contributions  of  the  world.  N.  P.  Willis's 
biblical  paraphrases  a  generation  or  more  ago  are  good, 
even  admirable.  But  they  are  as  water  to  the  wine  of 
the  original.  And  so  with  innumerable  rhymed  render- 
ings of  the  Psalms  and  other  portions  of  the  Scriptures  ; 
there  is  always  a  marked  loss  and,  in  most  cases,  the 
result  is  sad  indeed. 

It  all  comes  back  to  a  true  appreciation  of  that  won- 
derful thing,  personality.  The  personality  of  a  maker 
of  literature  finds  voice  in  his  chosen  word,  the  music 
that  is  in  him,  the  heat  of  his  inspiration.  It  is  the 
direct  offspring  of  a  creative  mood,  a  thing  of  his  blood 
and  bone,  distinctive,  set  apart.  Try  to  reset  it,  and 
the  jewel  will  not  gleam  forth  the  same.  The  Italian 
saying  sums  it  all  up  in  a  brace  of  pregnant  words: 
traduttore,  traditore, — "  translators  are  traitors." 


248 


Boofc  ©nc  1bunfcre&  ©ne 

LET  any  one  hand  me  a  list  of  the  hundred  best 
books,  and  immediately  and  rebelliously  I  name 
number  one-hundred-one  as  the  particular  bright 
jewel  of  my  soul.  I  resent  being  confined  to  a  cen- 
tury of  titles  and,  still  more,  I  resent  it  that  anybody, 
even  a  college  of  experts,  should  dictate  my  reading  in 
such  a  fashion.  Here  lies  the  fundamental  objection 
to  any  and  all  attempts  to  choose  a  certain  number  of 
classic  tomes  out  of  the  literature  of  the  world,  that 
we  may  read,  mark,  and  inwardly  digest,  and  then  feel 
that  we  are  truly  "  cultured."  Not  enough  leeway 
is  left  to  private  taste  and  personal  idiosyncrasy.  We 
no  more  want  our  list  predigested  by  other  people  than 
we  wish  to  substitute  a  food  pellet  for  an  honest, 
masticated  meal. 

Not  but  what  excellent  lists  have  been  furnished, 
early  and  late:  that  by  Ruskin  a  generation  ago,  the 
one  drawn  up  by  Dr.  Eliot  (assisted  by  a  formidable 
array  of  Harvard  specialists)  in  our  day.  Far  be  it 
from  me  to  deny  the  virtue  of  such  aids  to  the  (in- 
tellectually) injured.  But  I  get  a  certain  malicious 
joy  out  of  the  fact  that,  even  in  these  formal  and 
grave  efforts  at  wisdom,  the  personal  equation  creeps 
249 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^literature  anfc  SLife 

in,  to  invalidate  the  cut-and-dried  nature  of  the  work. 
Ruskin,  in  making  his  list,  struck  out  representative 
novelists  like  Dickens  and  Thackeray,  but  underscored 
Scott,  of  whom  he  was  a  worshiper;  clearly  a  case  of 
erratic  judgment.  And  so  some  Latin  scholar  might 
give  Lucretius  place  before  Virgil,  although  the  con- 
sensus of  opinion  would  be  the  other  way.  The  most 
violent  contradictions  rage  between  cultivated  knowers 
of  books  as  to  their  favorites  and,  if  the  whole  truth 
could  be  brought  forth,  it  is  likely  that  the  time- 
honored  conventional  statements  would  be  so  often 
disputed  by  private  opinion,  the  obiter  dicta  wherein 
we  tell  the  whole  truth  and  nothing  but  the  truth,  as 
to  leave  in  a  very  confused  state  of  mind  a  person  who 
assumes  that  relative  rank  in  literature  is  long  since 
settled. 

Of  course,  in  a  broad  sense  and  general  way,  settled 
it  is.  Your  notion  or  mine  about  William  Shakspere 
and  Homer  does  not  shake  either  author  from  the  place 
awarded  him  by  the  trained  criticism  of  centuries;  that 
may  be  acknowledged  without  debate.  Nevertheless,  I 
have  met  college  professors  of  literature  who  declared 
to  me,  under  the  rose,  that  they  saw  nothing  at  all  in 
the  dramas  of  the  Man  of  Stratford.  Did  anybody, 
who  did  not  have  to,  ever  read  Spenser's  "  Faerie 
Queene  "  straight  through,  and  preserve  a  liking  for  it, 
I  wonder? 

Be  all  this  as  it  may,  I  pity  the  man  who  does  not 
treasure  book  one  hundred  and  one;  meaning  the 
250 


SBoofc  <sme  1bun&re&  <S>ne 

volume  which  he  has  not  been  informed  he  must  read, 
as  a  means  to  literary  salvation,  but  which  he  dis- 
covers for  himself  and  loves  as  his  peculiar  and  pri- 
vate possession.  Perhaps  it  is  "  The  Story  of  My 
Heart,"  by  Richard  Jeffries,  that  unique  revelation  of 
a  shy  English  soul ;  or  Du  Maurier's  "  Peter  Ibett- 
son,"  the  author's  masterpiece,  so  much  more  delicate 
and  ideal  than  the  popular  "  Trilby  " ;  or  again,  your 
love  may  cling  to  a  short  tale  of  Ouida's,  about  a  dog, 
in  the  face  of  your  being  told  from  childhood  that 
she  is  a  thoroughly  shoddy  writer.  Maybe,  in  the 
days  when  you  could  manage  Greek  (how  long  ago 
they  seem!),  you  came  across  an  idyl  by  Theocritus 
which  you  loved  at  once  and  have  ever  since ;  you  com- 
mitted it  to  memory,  and  made  it  your  blood  and  bone 
by  countless  repetitions, —  though  no  human  being  you 
have  fallen  in  with  since  seemed  to  be  aware  of  its 
existence.  Or  in  your  browsings  in  German,  suddenly, 
years  ago,  a  minstrel  lay  by  Rudolph  Baumbach  was 
chanced  on,  and  it  appeared  to  be  especially  penned 
for  you,  so  that  you  lonesomely  cherish  it  and  quote  it 
only  for  your  intimates. 

These  are  the  recondite  pleasures  of  a  reader  who 
insists  upon  having  his  personal  likings  and  has  read 
widely  and  wisely  enough  to  have  the  courage  of  his 
convictions.  He  cares  not  a  button  that  these  little 
pearls  of  thought  and  expression  are  not  among  the 
world's  literary  wonders,  safely  catalogued  with  the 
Books  You  Must  Read;  sufficient  for  him  that  they 
251 


Xittle  Essays  in  literature  ant)  Xite 

give  him  a  lively  and  lasting  joy,  and  have  become 
veritable  comrades  of  the  mind.  Indeed,  he  gets  an 
added,  secret  satisfaction  in  the  thought  that  he  found 
them  as  likely  as  not  in  the  byways  and  hedges  of 
literature,  instead  of  in  the  beaten  highway  where  con- 
gregate the  elect.  Is  not  the  edge  of  the  pleasure 
blunted  when  one  sits  down  to  read  "  Faust "  or 
"  The  Divine  Comedy "  with  the  consciousness  that 
all  the  previous  generations  have  been  before  you  at 
the  feast,  that  you  are  taking  their  leavings,  as  it  were  ? 
This  is  not  a  democratic  reflection,  I  dare  say,  but  it  is 
a  natural  feeling  none  the  less.  How  delightful  to 
have  been  the  first  person  to  read  old  Homer,  and  how 
sweetly  the  poet,  whom  seven  cities  quarreled  for, 
must  have  sounded  in  ears  that  listened  for  the  first 
time  to  the  "surge  and  thunder"  of  the  Odyssey! 
Verily,  a  little  knowledge  is  a  dangerous  thing,  when 
it  teaches  you  beforehand  just  what  should  be  your 
estimate  of  an  accredited  masterpiece. 

It  would  be  an  interesting  experiment  to  turn  a 
senstive  young  reader  loose  in  a  library  containing  all 
the  choice  books  of  Time,  quite  uninstructed  in  rela- 
tive values,  and  then  watch  the  nai'f,  eager  spirit  taste, 
and  essay  and  compare  and  make  friends,  with  no  guide 
save  his  honest  leanings  and  unfeigned  loves.  The 
trouble  is  that,  with  no  previous  training,  the  choice 
would  likely  miss  the  mark;  the  books  worth  while 
might  sue  for  a  hearing  in  vain. 

But  I  am  inclined  to  insist  on  the  retention  of  a 
252 


IBooft  ©ne  Duufcrefc  <§>ne 

corner  at  least  where  one's  predilections  are  given 
free  play.  Pay  your  formal  compliments,  as  needs 
must,  to  the  chosen  one  hundred,  acknowledge  the 
wisdom  of  the  world's  decision,  and  then,  on  a  holiday, 
or  at  the  bed  hour  dedicated  to  pure  bookish  bliss 
before  sleep,  with  the  courage  of  your  faith  and  in  a 
mood  reckless  in  its  irresponsibility,  take  down  your 
good  book  one  hundred  one  from  the  shelf  (where  you 
keep  it  within  easy  reach)  and  revel  in  it,  regardless 
of  consequences.  That  odd,  extra  volume  may  do  you 
more  good  than  all  the  standard  authors  from  Homer 
to  O.  Henry.  For  after  all,  honesty  in  the  read- 
ing habit  is  quite  as  necessary  as  it  is  anywhere  else.  I 
confess  to  a  distinct  suspicion  of  one  who  has  no 
humble  companion  among  his  book  friends;  if  he  reads 
only  the  aristocrats,  I  charge  him  with  intellectual 
snobbery. 

Yes,  let  us  acquire  as  soon  as  possible  our  five-foot 
shelf  of  classics,  but  leave  a  margin  of  room  for  the 
unpretentious  darlings  of  our  hearts,  and  have  fre- 
quent sessions  with  them  in  all  tenderness  and  deep 
communion;  since  they  have  a  special  message  for  our 
souls  and  have  become  precious  even  as  those  things 
we  have  made  our  very  own. 


253 


Gaete  anb  (Benius  in  letters 

TO  have  taste  without  genius  implies  talent  in  a 
writer  and  a  likelihood  of  success.  To  have 
genius  without  taste  means  the  big  effects  of  litera- 
ture,—  and  possible  starvation.  It  certainly  makes 
probable  a  slower  recognition  than  is  sure  to  come  to 
the  man  of  taste  and  talent.  And  while  the  posses- 
sion of  one  does  not  of  necessity  insure  the  want  of 
the  other,  they  are  not  commonly  found  together. 

One  is  tempted  to  go  further  and  say  that  a  lack  of 
self-criticism  which  results  in  astonishing  inequality  of 
effect  is  a  mark  of  greatness.  Thus  the  greatest  writer 
of  the  English  race,  Shakspere,  is  one  in  whom  we  de- 
tect the  most  amazing  mingling  of  good  and  bad. 
There  are  passages  in  his  plays  so  undistinguished,  so 
utterly  lacking  the  hall-mark  of  genius,  as  to  seem  the 
work  of  another  hand.  Matthew  Arnold  long  since 
pointed  out  examples  of  such  inexplicable  falling  off, 
in  sharp  contrast  with  those  passages  wherein,  as  in 
this  from  "  Hamlet,"  we  have  the  Shakspere  all  the 
world  knows  and  loves: 

If  thou  didst  ever  hold  me  in  thy  heart, 
Absent  thee  from  felicity  awhile, 
And  in  this  harsh  world  draw  thy  breath  in  pain 
To  tell  my  story. 

254 


Uaste  anfc  Genius  in  ^Letters 

It  were  to  write  one's  self  down  as  insensitive  to 
what  makes  sound  literature  not  to  perceive  that  here 
we  have  the  distinctive  qualities  of  grace,  clarity,  and 
imaginative  beauty;  and  as  equally  insensitive  not  to 
be  aware  of  many  quotations  from  the  same  poet  which 
lack  them. 

It  would  be  also  an  easy  though  ungracious  task  to 
adduce  more  than  one  selection  from  Milton  where 
the  great  Puritan  poet,  the  second  greatest  of  the 
tongue,  is  uninspired  in  like  manner.  Nobody  is 
heavier  and  duller  than  Milton  at  his  worst,  unless  it 
be  Wordsworth,  and  the  latter  is  unquestionably  the 
finest  nature  poet  of  modern  England.  The  creator 
of  the  wonderful  sonnets,  of  the  lofty  odes  and  of  a 
score  of  exquisite  lyrics,  of  which  "  The  Highland 
Girl  "  is  an  example,  did  not  know  when  he  was  nod- 
ding and  napping.  Two-thirds  of  Walt  Whitman, 
hailed  abroad  as  in  some  ways  our  most  remarkable 
figure,  is  compounded  of  the  baldest  prose.  And 
Mark  Twain,  standing  beyond  cavil  with  the  half- 
dozen  of  America's  most  noteworthy  writers,  needed  a 
constraining  hand  to  save  him  from  his  own  failure  to 
recognize  literary  convenances.  Shelley,  unlike  Keats, 
is  at  times  hopelessly  unlyrical,  yet  is  often  rated  as  the 
greater  bard  of  the  two.  So  with  still  others,  lumina- 
ries of  the  larger  light,  fixed  stars,  rather  than  wan- 
dering, momentarily  brilliant  meteors. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  capable  talents  and  neat 
technicians  can  be  counted  on  not  to  do  the  wrong 
255 


Xittle  Bssa^s  in  literature  anfc  Xife 

thing.  They  never  offend,  partly,  it  would  seem,  be- 
cause they  never  thrill;  they  do  not  tumble  to  disaster, 
because  they  never  get  high  enough  to  make  the  fall 
dangerous.  The  really  creative  souls,  when  once 
seized  with  the  shaping  rapture,  are  too  full  of  pent- 
up  fire  to  let  it  out  a  la  mode,  through  a  blowpipe  of 
technic.  Their  mistakes  are  simply  the  penalty  of 
their  passion,  the  defect  of  their  quality.  Literary 
criticasters  in  earlier  years  were  fond  of  pointing  out 
the  shortcomings  of  Charles  Dickens,  a  creative  genius 
in  fiction,  if  ever  there  was  one.  They  did  not  stop 
to  see  that  Dickens  was  too  splendidly  engaged  in  giv- 
ing life  to  some  three  thousand  characters  for  the  de- 
lectation of  mankind,  to  cross  every  /  and  dot  each  i. 
Nor  did  they  sufficiently  reckon  with  the  fact  that  both 
Dickens  and  Thackeray  wrote  under  the  severest 
journalistic  pressure,  that  the  printer's  devil  con- 
tinually pushed  them  for  "  copy." 

Thus,  in  estimating  these  men,  and  others  of  the 
greater  gods,  two  things  not  necessarily  connected  at 
all  are  confused:  taste  and  genius.  The  mistake  is 
made  of  imagining  that  because  a  writer  has  the  highest 
creative  capacity  he  also  possesses,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
the  critical  faculty  as  well.  The  ideal  would  be,  such 
powers  in  conjunction:  creative  fire  and  the  forthright 
hand  to  control  it  to  the  finest  purposes  of  art.  But 
such  a  conjunction  in  the  literary  firmament  is  almost 
as  rare  as  the  conjunction  of  the  earth  with  the  sun. 
Now  and  then,  however,  in  literary  history  such 

256 


Uaste  anfc  Genius  in  Xetters 

writers  appear;  ancients  like  Virgil  and  Sappho,  mod- 
erns like  Heine  and  Stevenson. 

Fragmentary  as  are  the  remains  of  the  Greek  woman 
singer,  her  lyrics,  by  the  consent  of  scholars,  show  a 
mastery  of  form  commensurate  with  the  passion  of 
beauty  which  she  poured  into  them;  the  plastic  mold 
which  received  the  primal  fire  of  her  word  was  ap- 
parent, like  a  preciously  perfect  casket  to  hold  jewels 
above  price.  And  so  with  Virgil,  "  wielder  qf  the 
stateliest  measure  ever  molded  by  the  lips  of  man,"  as 
Tennyson  hailed  him;  his  epic  theme  did  not  lead  him 
into  carelessness,  but  noble  thought  was  married  to 
lovely  expression  to  make  him  one  of  the  permanent 
poets. 

Nor  can  criticism  deny  to  Heine,  a  secondary  figure, 
perhaps,  in  the  significance  of  his  message,  such  a  union 
of  fiery  feeling  and  faultless  expression  as  to  make  him 
a  good  illustration  of  the  blend  of  taste  and  genius 
which  we  have  in  mind.  He  was,  among  other  things, 
a  master  of  that  anticlimax  which  is  a  danger  to  the 
literary  artist;  but  in  general  handled  it  with  a  con- 
summate skill  which  hid  the  peril.  And  for  simple, 
sensuous,  piercingly  pathetic  effects  where  is  his  su- 
perior ? 

As  for  Stevenson,  his  word  to  mankind  was  as  vital 
as  his  art  was  flawless  and  forever  alluring.  One  can- 
not side  with  those  who  think  his  art  was  more  than  his 
intellect.  The  doctrine  of  good  cheer,  courage,  faith 
and  kindliness  which  he  so  valiantly  preached  through 
257 


Xittle  Essays  tn  ^literature  anfc  Xife 

twenty  volumes  was  a  welcome  one  to  a  time  suffering 
from  spiritual  megrim.  The  cake  had  turned  to  sour 
dough  and  the  child  had  infantile  pains.  Stevenson 
was  the  kindly  physician  with  a  sure  cure.  But  his 
pill  was  so  deliciously  sugar-coated  that  it  was  great 
fun  to  take  his  medicine,  and  some  even  thought  they 
were  sucking  candy,  instead  of  being  treated  for  a 
definite  complaint.  There  is  but  one  such  in  a  gen- 
eration ;  a  writer  who  unites  creative  genius  with  such 
a  mastery  of  form  as  to  make  him  at  once  a  model  for 
imitation  and  a  source  of  inspiration.  In  such  a  writer 
the  antagonism  of  taste  and  genius  disappears  in  a  sort 
of  chemical  union. 

Nevertheless,  the  contrast  is  likely  to  be  eternal. 
On  one  hand,  Aristophanes,  Rabelais,  Richter,  Carlyle, 
Whitman,  and  Twain,  mighty  men  but  unsure  artists; 
on  the  other,  Horace,  Virgil,  Tennyson,  and  Steven- 
son, whose  beautiful  artistry  has  not  quenched  the 
personal  charm  behind  it.  And  half-way  between  the 
two  classes  come  the  talents,  little  and  large,  the  wel- 
come minores  who  suit  our  more  mundane  moods.  To 
name  them  were  less  than  kind;  yet  to  know  them  is 
often  pleasant.  They  have  their  place,  albeit  a  modest 
one.  Taste  has  its  triumphs,  as  well  as  genius. 


258 


povert?  of  poets 

THE  poverty  of  poets  is  proverbial.  Their  lack 
of  this  world's  goods,  treated  humorously,  is  one 
of  the  most  reverend  jokes  known  to  man.  And  there 
is  enough  in  literary  history  to  keep  it  alive,  although 
the  facts  are  by  no  means  all  that  way.  But  there  is 
something  romantic  in  the  idea  of  a  member  of  the 
singing  craft  going  hungry,  wanting  mere  necessary 
bread,  while  he  bestows  priceless  riches  upon  a  heedless 
world.  And  so  the  public  all  but  resents  a  Browning 
who  looks  like  a  prosperous  banker  and  has  never  been 
indigent,  or  a  Tennyson  whose  emoluments  place  him 
with  the  financially  successful.  How  much  more  ap- 
pealing to  behold  a  blind  beggar  called  Homer,  or  a 
Poe  hardly  able  to  buy  bread  and  forced  to  sit  beside 
his  dying  wife  and  see  her  shiver  because  of  the  dearth 
of  bedclothes! 

Money-shortness  has  become  a  sort  of  stage  property 
for  the  bard,  along  with  unshorn  hair,  a  Byronic  col- 
lar. Any  popular  man  of  straw,  imagined  by  the  gen- 
eral, magnified  and  clung  to,  becomes  dear;  it  is  so 
inconvenient  to  have  the  truth  come  along  and  knock 
the  theory  into  a  cocked  hat.  One  has  to  do  some  new 
thinking  to  change  the  caricature,  to  reconstruct  the 
259 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^literature  anfc  OLife 

idol,  which  means  extra  work  that  is  not  pleasant. 
The  noble  genus  known  as  Pinhead  hates  to  deduce 
an  idea  from  the  facts  by  his  own  unaided  exertions, 
instead  of  comfortably  taking  opinions  second-hand 
from  the  community.  Hence,  long  live  the  mendicant 
minstrel,  and  may  his  shadow  never  grow  —  not  less, 
but  more,  nor  his  paunch  be  lined  with  good  capon! 

The  grain  of  truth  in  the  notion  is  to  be  discovered 
in  the  appearance  of  immediate  inutility  made  by 
poetry.  The  poet  produces  beauty  as  a  profession,  as 
does  every  artist,  and  at  first  blush  —  a  good  figure, 
by  the  bye,  to  use  of  the  poet  —  his  wares  have  neither 
the  look  of  utility  nor  commodity.  They  sell  cheap, 
if  they  sell  at  all,  in  the  open  competitive  market. 
And  so  Signor  Singer  goes  but  poorly  clad,  and  may- 
hap worries  extensively  about  the  next  meal. 

Then  an  absurd  thing  happens  to  the  artist,  be  he 
painter,  poet,  or  what  you  will :  the  community  grows 
rich,  cultured,  civilized;  the  reputation  of  the  humble 
beauty-maker  increases  also,  and  lo,  you  see  Signor 
Singer  getting  his  thousands  a  night,  a  violinist  coining 
gold  out  of  a  skilful  bow,  an  "  Angelus  "  selling  for 
more  than  a  hundred  thousand  dollars, —  and  so  on 
with  fairy  tales  that  are  real.  Art  becomes  an  Open 
Sesame  to  all  the  money-bags,  and  he  that  was  poor 
waxeth  proud. 

In  this  triumphal  progress  of  Art  —  the  capital  may 
now  be  respectfully  adopted  —  the  Poet  —  also  capital- 
ized —  gets  his  share  of  fame  and  fortune,  albeit  never 
260 


TTbe  poverty  ot  poets 

quite  so  plutocratic  as  his  brothers  of  color  and  sound. 
But  he  gets  good  pay  for  his  work;  Tennyson,  it  is 
said,  received  five  thousand  dollars  for  a  short  poem 
from  the  Youth's  Companion,  which  seems  poetic  com- 
pensation for  Milton's  twenty-five  dollars  for  "  Para- 
dise Lost."  The  successful  poet  can  certainly  be  com- 
fortable, to  put  it  mildly,  if  he  drop  the  Bohemian 
habits  so  long  attributed  to  him  —  another  stage  prop- 
erty —  and  save  his  dollars. 

Just  now  we  are  being  told  that  Alfred  Noyes  is  a 
good  business  man,  commanding  and  getting  prices  that 
enable  him  to  live  from  his  verse.  And  he  is  being 
pointed  out  as  a  sort  of  infant  phenomenon,  since  he  can 
afford  to  go  from  city  to  city  by  Pullman  and  not  walk 
a  la  Homer  and  other  songful  indigents.  To  treat  him 
as  unique  is,  of  course,  all  nonsense;  but  it  is  just  as 
well  that  he  be  temporarily  an  object-lesson  to  illustrate 
what  is  true  of  many  more  of  that  genus.  Respect  for 
his  ability  may  lead  to  a  better  opinion  of  the  army  of 
his  fellow-poets. 

Judging  by  the  amount  of  printed  space  relatively 
filled  by  prose  and  verse,  poetry  is  very  well  paid  in- 
deed. A  person  with  a  fair  reputation  often  receives 
fifty  dollars  for  a  poem  which  occupies  a  single  maga- 
zine page.  Get  out  the  tape  measure  and  you  will 
find  that  a  prose  writer  who  gets  a  like  amount  by  the 
page  is  doing  extremely  well.  Of  course,  this  is  mis- 
leading, for  genuine  poetry  is  not  to  be  written  so 
steadily  as  prose  nor  is  the  demand  for  it  so  great; 
261 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^Literature  ant)  OLife 

still,  the  reward  in  the  case  of  poetry  is  by  no  means 
contemptible.  A  high-class  publication  will  give 
twenty  to  twenty-five  dollars  for  a  sonnet.  The  elect 
know  that  a  sonnet  is  only  fourteen  lines  in  length,  al- 
though to  the  uninitiated  it  looks  like  a  mere  pendant 
to  a  prose  article ;  which  again  is  not  so  bad  as  it  might 
be.  No,  the  facts  of  remuneration  hardly  square  with 
the  traditional  pathetic  picture  of  the  bard  out-at-el- 
bows. 

The  homely  truth  is  that,  if  a  poet  is  a  shabbily  pic- 
turesque object,  it  is  because  he  has  a  screw  loose  some- 
where, not  because  he  is  a  poet.  It  can  be  granted 
to  the  advocatus  diaboli  that  the  nature  of  his  work 
lays  him  open  to  the  temptations  of  the  imagination 
and  the  emotions,  not  to  say  the  passions.  But  to  im- 
ply that  the  poet  has  to  go  wrong,  as  if  it  were  his 
line  of  business,  is  ridiculous.  Here  we  meet  with  the 
fallacy  of  generalizations,  a  tendency  of  the  human 
mind  that  has  slain  its  thousands,  and,  it  may  be  sub- 
joined, very  often  with  the  jawbone  of  an  ass.  Neither 
poets  nor  any  other  class  of  men  are  all  of  a  piece. 
Both  Coleridge  and  Wordsworth  were  great  poets  and 
friends  and  neighbors  up  in  the  Lake  Country  of  Eng- 
land. But  the  one  never  paid  his  bills,  ran  away  from 
his  family  and  drank  laudanum,  while  the  other  was  of 
character  so  austerely  high  that  one  is  almost  repelled 
from  him  and  would  fain  hear  that  he  turned  Bohe- 
mian once  in  a  blue  moon,  at  least. 

It  is  lazy   thinking,   again,   which  leads  people   to 
262 


poverty  of 

establish  a  category  for  all  poets,  with  a  few  over- 
worked criteria,  and  then  to  judge  the  clan  thereby. 
Take  Horace's  genus  irritabile  vatum,  for  one  ex- 
ample. The  idea  is  that  the  race  of  bards  is  thin- 
skinned,  hypersensitive,  quick  to  take  offense.  No 
doubt  this  is  true  of  many  a  bard.  But  how  about  the 
actor  and  the  singer ;  yes,  and  the  plumber  too,  when 
you  hint  that  his  work  is  slack,  or  his  charge  excessive? 
Does  not  he  get  out  of  sorts  also?  The  poet  has  to 
father  an  entirely  natural  failing  of  the  human  race, 
just  because  an  amiable  country  gentleman  and  charm- 
ing lyrist  back  in  the  Roman  days,  thinking  of  the  class 
he  knew  well,  made  a  harmless  remark,  as  it  seemed, 
which  he  did  not  himself  take  too  seriously.  Horace 
had  a  sense  of  humor,  and  here  is  where  he  plays  a 
posthumous  joke  on  the  world.  He  did  n't  half  mean 
it, —  remember  that. 

Let  us,  then,  allow  the  poets  to  be  respectable,  even 
if  poor,  and  not  even  poor,  if  they  can  manage  to  make 
money.  Poetic  composition  is  not  absolutely  incom- 
patible with  cutting  coupons,  although  the  two  acts  are 
not  likely  to  be  found  in  conjunction.  And  there  is 
no  reason  in  the  nature  of  things  why  genius  should  be 
disreputable,  in  spite  of  all  the  Nordaus. 


263 


flDattetvof'ifact  fiction 

VEN  as  the  danger  of  the  romantic  in  literature 
is  that  it  shall  not  stand  on  mother  earth,  so 
that  of  the  matter-of-fact  treatment  of  things  is  that 
it  shall  deny  the  dream  and  forget  the  vision.  Nor 
is  the  second  danger  less  than  the  first. 

This  is  the  possible  lack,  one  feels,  in  an  acute  ob- 
server of  mankind  like  Arnold  Bennett,  whose  new 
book  giving  his  impressions  of  the  United  States  is  in 
the  reader's  hands  and  will  be  generally  discussed,  no 
doubt,  this  winter :  a  singularly  frank  and  honest  book, 
and  most  readable.  Perhaps  nobody  in  our  time  has 
probed  with  surer  hand  the  secrets  of  the  spirit,  and 
more  subtly  revealed  its  arcana  than  this  young  British 
novelist.  You  realize  in  reading  him  that  little  of  the 
hidden  springs  of  conduct  escapes  his  eye.  Yet,  if  at 
times  he  seems  slow  and  uninspiring,  here  is  the  reason : 
he  appears  all  but  obsessed  with  the  commonplace  and 
the  routine  of  everyday  existence. 

Hilda  Lessway's  exceedingly  humdrum  thoughts  and 
doings  are  interesting,  in  a  way,  because  they  stand  for 
so  many  of  us;  then,  too,  we  are  sympathetically  in- 
volved because  they  are  so  interesting  to  her.  We  see 
through  her  eyes.  Nevertheless,  there  are  moments 
264 


d&atter*of*=jfact  fiction 

when  one  waxes  impatient  of  all  such  fiction,  and 
would  be  with  Alan  in  the  round  house  in  Stevenson's 
"  Kidnapped,"  or  with  the  robbers  in  the  cave  in 
Scott's  "  Guy  Mannering,"  or  close  beside  Beauty  as 
he  rides  that  wonderful  winning  race  in  the  opening 
pages  of  Ouida's  "  Under  Two  Flags."  Explain  it 
as  we  will,  excuse  it  if  we  must,  there  is  something  in 
humanity  that,  after  a  surfeit  of  matter-of-fact  fiction, 
flares  up  in  hot  rebellion  and  demands  a  picture  that 
is  livelier  and  lovelier. 

Not  all  excitement  is  vicious,  either  in  life  or  letters, 
and  the  colors  of  the  spectrum  include  red  and  violet 
and  suchlike  romantic  effects.  It  may  be  the  sad  priv- 
ilege of  mature  years  to  recognize  a  land  of  dead- 
level,  but  youth  knows  better,  because  youth  is  passing 
its  days  in  a  manner  so  different,  and  an  attitude  so 
profoundly  other,  as  not  only  to  be  bored  by  the  gray- 
toned  realist,  but  flatly  to  deny  the  truth  of  his  rep- 
resentation. Who  among  us  of  the  male  sex  does  not 
remember  that  thrilling  moment  of  romance  far  back 
in  the  dewy  past,  when,  at  four  a.  m.  (the  hour  may 
have  its  variations,  but  the  mood  is  constant),  we 
slipped  out  of  a  side  door  of  the  parental  dwelling  and, 
with  pockets  bursting  with  fire-crackers  and  other  in- 
cendiary material,  whistled  up  the  street  for  the  mates 
who,  similarly  equipped,  were  forgathering  at  the 
rendezvous?  The  street  at  that  early  hour  looked 
gray  enough  to  ordinary  observation.  But  not  so;  it 
was  to  boyish  vision  one  splendid,  hectic  red,  because 

265 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^literature  an&  Xife 

it  held  all  the  glorious  possibilities  of  the  Fourth  of 
July,  and  several  beautiful  hours  were  between  this  and 
breakfast,  that  unromantic  thing  of  sheer  necessity. 
To  deny  romance  to  a  world  that  contains  one  such 
experience  (and  of  course  there  are  a  million  of  them) 
is  too  absurd  to  waste  words  on. 

The  maker  of  the  matter-of-fact  kind  of  thing,  how- 
ever, puts  in  a  prompt  protest :  he  declares  that  what  to 
our  uneducated  eye  appears  so  commonplace,  to  him  is 
wildly  exciting,  even  ultra-romantic.  Henry  James,  in 
an  able  dissertation  on  the  art  of  fiction,  tells  us  that  to 
him  an  ordinary  conversation  about  trivial  affairs,  be- 
tween two  average  humans,  is  so  fraught  with  tre- 
mendous implication  as  to  be  a  sort  of  spiritual  adven- 
ture for  the  novelist.  We  cannot  deny  him  his  feeling. 
But  we  can  reply  that,  in  this,  he  is  hardly  typical  of 
the  human  race.  That  same  bit  of  dialogue  does  not 
enthrall  others  as  it  does  him;  and,  after  all,  fiction  is 
a  communicative  art  or  nothing. 

It  is  not  that  mankind  demands  excitement  that  is 
purely  objective  and  external.  No,  that  were  to  over- 
look the  fact,  not  to  be  disputed,  that  the  modern  in- 
terest is  more  and  more  psychologic.  There  may  be 
far  more  of  interest,  in  the  true  sense,  in  a  scene  where 
two  persons  sit  quietly  in  chairs  on  opposite  sides  of 
a  deal  table  and  talk  together  in  tones  never  above  the 
conversational  than  there  would  be  in  the  rescue,  just 
in  the  nick  of  time,  of  a  gentleman  bound  to  a  railroad 
track  by  human  fiends,  two  seconds  before  the  express 
266 


flDatter*ot*jf act  jfiction 

swept  by.  The  two  at  the  table  may  be  settling  their 
fates  for  all  eternity,  and  every  word  they  utter  may 
be  pregnant  with  doom.  Probably,  this  for  the  modern 
mind  is  as  gripping  as  any  scene  that  can  be  depicted. 
It  is  the  way  an  Ibsen  or  a  Shaw  or  a  Galsworthy 
chooses  to  interpret  life. 

The  excitement  must  be  there,  whatever  its  kind; 
and  for  the  novelist  to  make  a  god  of  the  dull  and  then 
expect  us,  the  long-suffering  public,  to  gasp  with  in- 
terest instead  of  gaping  with  ennui  is  to  ask  too  much 
of  human  nature.  I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  Ben- 
nett produces  this  effect  commonly,  but  simply  that  his 
method  suggests  this  train  of  reflection;  also  that,  in 
poorer  hands  than  his,  the  result  is  indeed  lamentable. 

Do  not  forget  it  as  among  your  duties,  O  Master 
Novelist,  to  show  us  the  unusual:  the  unusual  in 
incident,  scene  and  character,  not  lying  about  life,  oh 
no,  but  merely  recognizing  that  that  which  may  occur 
—  and  once  in  a  while  does  —  has  a  fresher  interest 
for  us,  naturally,  than  that  which  confronts  us  every 
morning  of  the  week.  Go  to  life  for  your  material, 
and  observe  that  she  —  we  attribute  femininity  to  her 
because  she  is  so  delightfully  uncertain  —  very  often 
has  a  card  up  her  sleeve  that  makes  the  game  tense. 
Get  off  your  own  street  if  you  find  that  it  does  not 
furnish  you  with  the  exceptional;  or,  perhaps  better, 
clear  your  eyes  of  mist  and  see  that  those  desirably 
romantic  things  are  occurring  there  too,  right  under 
your  nose.  If  it  has  come  to  the  pass  where  all  is 

267 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  ant>  SLife 

flat,  stale  and  unprofitable,  decide  that  you  are  out  of 
health,  or  have  missed  your  calling.  It  is  likely  that 
your  business  of  novel-writing  looks  more  monotonous 
to  you  than  it  should,  and  you  are  passing  over  that 
tired  feeling  to  us.  On  the  contrary,  your  occupation 
should  seem  as  fair  and  fresh  and  exhilarating  to  you 
as  a  baseball  game  to  a  boy,  or  a  moonlight  meeting 
to  a  pair  of  lovers.  Heavens,  man,  think  what  you  have 
for  a  theme:  Life,  the  exhaustless,  the  marvelous, 
the  varied;  Life,  the  homely  yet  divine,  the  near  yet 
the  starry-high, —  the  bitter-sweet,  incalculable,  mys- 
terious gift  of  the  Maker  of  all ! 

It  is  a  sad  sight  to  see  a  writer,  who  has  attained  to 
a  consummate  mastery  of  the  technic  of  his  art,  soured 
on  life,  his  doll  stuffed  with  sawdust,  and  so  offering  us 
a  shell  instead  of  the  substance  and  sustenance  we  need. 
We  can  agree  with  Howells  that  the  commonplace  is 
precious,  and  yet  leave  room  for  the  uncommon.  And 
we  can  nod  assent  to  the  thing  we  know,  yet  welcome 
the  fascinating,  hitherto  unknown,  for  those  larger  ex- 
periences help  us  to  grow. 


268 


Stevenson's 

I  DRAW  from  its  handsome  case  of  green  crushed 
levant  a  little  book,  faded  from  its  original  proud 
purple  to  a  nondescript  brown,  and  entitled  "  Family 
Prayers,"  by  the  author  of  "  The  Faithful  Promiser," 
"  Morning  and  Night  Watches,"  etc.  The  publisher's 
imprint  is  that  of  James  Nesbit  &  Company,  London, 
the  year  of  publication  1853.  A  commonplace  volume, 
surely,  whether  one  looks  to  external  garb  or  literary 
content.  A  prayer-book  of  over  half  a  century  ago, 
bound  in  sober  cloth,  undistinguished  in  paper,  print 
or  binding,  is  no  such  matter. 

But  stay,  gentle  reader.  We  are  not  come  to  the 
heart  of  this  business  yet.  Human  associations  gather 
about  this  ordinary  volume  to  give  it  spiritual  signifi- 
cance. It  is  the  most  precious  item  in  my  library.  For 
on  a  blank  page  is  written,  in  a  large  flowing  hand, 
the  name  of  Thomas  Stevenson;  and  turning  to  the 
fly-leaf  (already  with  a  quiver,  mayhap,  of  expectation), 
one  discovers  a  visiting-card  affixed  thereon  which 
reads : 

Mr.   Robert  Louis   Stevenson, 

Athenaeum  Club, 

Skerryvore,  London. 

Bournemouth. 

By  this  time  those  who  are  sealed  of  the  tribe  of 

269 


Xittle  Essays  in  literature  an&  Xife 

Tusitala  know  full  well  why  this  homely  book  is 
to  its  owner  of  inestimable  worth;  and,  forsooth,  an 
object  of  interest  to  all  bibliophiles  the  world  over. 
Stevenson's  father,  as  the  signature  shows,  acquired 
the  volume  presumptively  when  his  famous  son  was 
a  mere  lad  —  for  he  was  but  three  when  it  was  pub- 
lished. And  in  the  fullness  of  years,  when  Louis  was 
a  young  man  already  beginning  to  drift  from  the  or- 
thodoxy embodied  in  the  prayer-book,  it  came  into 
his  possession  and  was  apparently  used  much  and  made 
his  own,  as  the  pages  with  their  penciled  marks  in  his 
own  handwriting  testify.  Inserted  between  the  leaves 
are  sundry  ferns,  which  upon  expert  botanical  analysis 
reveal  themselves  as  tropical  beyond  peradventure,  and 
so  point  to  the  conclusion  that  Stevenson  had  the 
volume  wTith  him  in  the  final  years  in  Samoa; 
while  the  visiting-card  suggests  his  possession  of  it  in 
an  earlier  portion  of  his  career.  The  volume  also 
contains,  to  augment  its  interest  and  value,  two  sheets 
of  mourning  letter-paper,  upon  which  are  inscribed,  in 
the  elder  Stevenson's  large  hand :  "  Passages  of  Scrip- 
ture to  be  read  in  connection  with  each  other " ;  the 
references  which  follow  filling  five  pages,  now  yellowed 
by  time.  Furthermore,  there  is  at  least  one  inser- 
tion in  the  son's  hand,  while  certain  penciled  additions 
in  yet  another  hand  suggest  the  novelist's  mother, — 
that  devoted  mother  who  so  valiantly  followed  him 
to  the  far-lying  Southern  islands  which  were  to  be  his 
"  long  home." 

270 


Stevenson's 

With  this  prayer-book  before  us,  how  easy  to  con- 
jure up  a  picture  of  the  family  group  in  the  Heriot 
Street  house  in  the  central  part  of  gray  old  Edinburgh. 
That  residence  — "  a  substantial  house  of  gray  stone 
built  with  the  solidity  so  customary  in  Scotland ;  look- 
ing across  the  Queen  Street  Gardens,  where  the  lilacs 
bloomed  in  spring  and  the  pipe  of  the  blackbird  might 
be  heard,  while  from  its  back  windows  could  be  seen 
the  hills  of  the  Kingdom  of  Fife  " —  was  the  third  oc- 
cupied by  the  Stevensons  during  the  life  of  Louis. 
Thither  they  removed  when  he  was  seven,  and  it  is 
that  mansion  which,  amply  described  by  him  and  others, 
we  associate  with  the  writer,  boy  and  man.  In  an 
upper  story  was  his  small  suite  of  rooms,  one  of  them 
originally  his  nursery;  it  was  here  he  grew  up,  at- 
tended not  only  by  his  mother,  but  by  Cummy,  that 
wonder  among  nurses,  whose  memory  is  so  fragrantly 
intertwined  with  those  flowers  of  the  imagination,  "  A 
Child's  Garden  of  Verses."  In  this  house,  doubtless, 
God-fearing  and  regular  as  it  was,  the  prayers  in  the 
little  brown  book  must  have  been  read  aloud  many 
a  morning,  delivered  with  all  the  picturesque  unction 
we  know  Thomas  Stevenson  to  have  possessed,  from 
more  than  one  description  left  by  the  son.  One  longs 
to  find  in  the  mass  of  memorabilia  which  Robert  Louis 
gave  to  the  world  some  direct  chronicle  of  this  book, 
some  hint  of  its  use  or  token  of  its  presence.  But 
none  such,  I  fear,  can  be  found ;  at  any  rate,  my  search 
has  been  in  vain.  It  must  remain  for  the  mind's  eye 
271 


Xittle  Essays  in  literature  anfc  3Life 

to  see  the  Heriot  Street  group  listening  from  day  to 
day  to  the  words  of  worship  drawn  from  the  "  Family 
Prayers." 

The  visiting-card,  witnessing  to  the  fact  that  in  due 
time  the  little  volume  passed  from  father  to  son,  is  also 
an  evocation ;  it  recalls  a  three  years'  section  of  his  life, 
momentous  to  himself  and,  in  truth,  to  late  nineteenth- 
century  letters.  It  was  the  period  of  his  mid-manhood, 
when,  from  thirty-four  to  thirty-seven  years  of  age, 
he  lived  the  life  of  an  invalid  at  Bournemouth,  in  the 
house  which  his  father,  then  fast  aging  towards  death, 
had  presented  to  Mrs.  Stevenson,  and  upon  which  the 
name  "  Skerryvore,"  signifying  the  most  beautiful  of 
the  lighthouses  built  of  the  family  firm,  had  been  ap- 
propriately bestowed.  Stevenson,  with  that  pathetic 
capacity  of  his  for  pleasure  in  the  good  things  of 
fortune,  had  been  vastly  delighted  over  this  gift  and 
enjoyed  to  the  utmost  the  family  installation  in  their 
new  demesne.  It  is  described  by  Mr.  Balfour  as  "  a 
modern  brick  house,  closely  covered  with  ivy ;  from  the 
top  windows  it  was  possible  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  the 
sea.  There  was  one-half  an  acre  of  ground,  very 
charmingly  arranged,  running  down  from  the  lawns 
at  the  back,  past  a  bank  of  heather,  into  a  chine  or 
small  ravine  full  of  rhododendrons  and  at  the  bottom 
a  tiny  stream."  As  for  the  author's  childlike  delight 
in  the  house,  take  this  very  characteristic  bit  from  the 
Letters :  "  Our  drawing-room  is  now  so  beautiful 
that  it 's  like  eating  to  sit  in  it.  No  other  room  is  so 
272 


Stevenson's 

lovely  in  the  world ;  there  I  sit  like  an  old  Irish  beggar- 
man's  cast-off  bauchle  in  a  palace  throne-room.  Incon- 
gruity never  went  so  far;  I  blush  for  the  figure  I  cut 
in  such  a  bower." 

From  the  view-point  of  literary  creation,  this  frag- 
ment of  his  life  was  one  of  the  most  brilliant  —  perhaps 
the  most  brilliant  —  of  his  whole  career.  It  was  dur- 
ing these  three  years  at  Skerryvore  that  he  gave  forth 
the  "  Child's  Garden,"  "  Prince  Otto,"  "  Dr.  Jekyll 
and  Mr.  Hyde  "  and  "  Kidnapped  " —  a  quartette 
hardly  to  be  matched  by  any  other  four  books  he  pro- 
duced. But,  alas !  his  health  steadily  declined ;  seldom 
was  he  able  to  go  up  to  London  and  make  use  of  The 
Athenaeum  Club,  of  which,  as  his  card  indicates,  he 
was  a  member,  there  to  meet  Colvin,  perhaps,  or  Lang 
or  Henley,  friends  and  cronies  all.  For  the  most  part, 
he  could  not  pass  the  confines  of  his  own  grounds. 
Hemorrhages  were  frequent  and  violent;  an  enemy 
"  who  was  exciting  at  first,  but  has  now,  by  the  itera- 
tion of  his  strokes,  become  merely  annoying  and  inex- 
pressibly irksome,"  is  his  own  comment. 

Then,  too,  his  father,  who  came  down  with  his 
wife  to  live  at  Bournemouth  in  the  autumn  of  1886, 
in  order  to  be  near  the  son  for  the  ensuing  winter, 
rapidly  failed  and  died  in  the  next  spring,  his  condi- 
tion, mental  as  well  as  physical,  being  sad  indeed.  So 
that  Stevenson's  day  darkened  at  this  time  in  more 
ways  than  one.  So  poorly  was  he  that,  when  sum- 
moned to  Edinburgh  by  his  father's  passing,  he  went 
273 


3Ltttie  Essays  fn  Xtteratute  an&  %ife 

there,  but  was  unable  to  attend  the  funeral  because  of 
a  severe  cold  he  had  contracted.  Yet  the  impression 
one  gets  of  this  period  from  the  Letters,  and  from 
various  other  biographical  testimony,  is  by  no  means 
one  of  gloom  or  discouragement;  the  incorrigible  zest 
of  life  was  always  there:  the  keen  interests,  the  gaiety, 
the  nobler  interpretation  of  that  "  Sufficient-unto-the- 
day "  creed  which  is  so  valuable  for  this  workaday 
world.  Dear  friends  of  his  —  men  like  Henley  and 
Fleeming  Jenkins  —  were  often  at  Skerryvore,  and 
many  were  the  revels  and  junketings  of  which  it  was  the 
center,  despite  the  frailty  of  the  Master.  And  to  end 
with  the  brighter  side,  it  was  the  books  begun  or  com- 
pleted at  Bournemouth  upon  which  his  reputation  most 
securely  rests.  The  imagination  kindles  at  the  thought 
that,  could  we  have  sat  with  Stevenson  in  his  much- 
admired  drawing-room,  or  still  better,  beside  his  bed  up- 
stairs during  one  of  the  enforced  sojourns  in  "  the  land 
of  counterpane,"  we  might  have  picked  up  casually 
from  the  nearest  table  the  little  prayer-book  now  before 
us.  Surely  it  had  tales  to  tell  of  Skerryvore  and  its 
doings.  Often  it  must  have  been  in  hand,  one  deems; 
as  likely  as  not  it  was  read  from  daily,  in  private  de- 
votion or  family  worship  —  we  know  such  to  have  been 
the  Samoan  habit,  and  the  proximity  of  the  parents  in 
that  last  Bournemouth  winter  makes  it  the  more  prob- 
able. But  the  brown  book,  however  lovingly  en- 
treated, will  not  unlock  its  secrets.  We  must  content 
us  with  inference  and  guess. 
274 


Stevenson's 

In  view  of  his  own  unique  series  of  fourteen  prayers 
written  for  household  use  at  Vailima,  valued  alike  by 
the  lovers  of  literature  and  the  devotees  of  religious 
aspiration,  Stevenson's  ownership  and  use  of  this 
paternal  volume  take  on  a  special  significance.  One's 
curiosity  is  piqued  by  the  question  whether,  in  any 
traceable  way,  he  was  influenced  by  the  family  heirloom 
in  the  penning  of  his  own  petitions.  Were  there  uncon- 
scious echoes  of  the  cadences  falling  so  early  on  his  ear, 
in  the  more  perfect  prose  rhythms  of  the  prayers  he 
wrote  while  he  lived  in  the  South  Seas?  It  hardly 
seems  whimsical  to  believe  that  there  may  be  some 
connection  between  the  two:  for  his  cousin,  Mrs. 
Napier,  writes :  "  In  the  Vailima  prayers  I  seem  to 
hear  again  an  old  melody  that  I  know  well  —  the  echo 
of  his  father's  words  and  daily  devotions."  It  would 
be  going  too  far  to  assume  that  this  refers  only  to  the 
impromptu  contributions  to  the  home  worship  by 
Thomas  Stevenson.  It  may  well  be  that  the  prayers 
of  this  very  volume  were  in  mind.  There  are,  at  the 
end  of  the  book  of  "  Family  Prayers,"  a  dozen  prayers 
for  specific  occasions,  and  it  is  but  natural  to  read  these 
side  by  side  with  Stevenson's  own,  in  the  hope  that 
some  parallel  may  be  discovered  suggesting  direct  in- 
fluence. But  no  such  result  follows.  Indeed,  Steven- 
son's contribution  to  precatory  literature  is  distin- 
guished above  all  else  by  its  unconventional  handling, 
its  complete  dismissal  of  the  orthodox  terminology  and 
mental  attitude  which  characterize  the  "  Family  Pray- 
275 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^literature  anfc  SLife 

ers  " ;  and  also  by  its  special  adaptation  to  the  setting 
of  the  habitat  at  Vailima  —  as  illustrated,  for  example, 
by  the  two  prayers  entitled  "  In  Time  of  Rain."  No 
more  striking  illustration  of  the  difference  between  the 
elder  and  younger  generation  in  the  matter  of  religious 
faith  and  religious  consolation  could  be  found  than  that 
afforded  by  these  two  sets  of  invocations.  Reading 
those  composed  by  Stevenson,  one  feels  that  for  the  man 
of  our  day  there  have  come,  verily,  a  new  heaven  and 
a  new  earth.  And  one  also  feels  that  in  the  spirit  of 
worship,  although  the  form  be  changed,  the  new  is  full 
as  vital  and  deep  as  the  old.  It  is  the  personal,  the 
individualistic  note  you  hear,  as  against  the  traditional 
and  associate  in  the  things  of  God. 

But  there  are  other  features  worth  mentioning  about 
the  copy  of  "  Family  Prayers."  Noticeable  at  a  first 
reading  is  the  excellence  of  its  manner,  the  harmonious, 
even  high  beauty  of  the  language  in  which  it  is  couched. 
The  prayers  are  independent  in  form  of  the  unsur- 
passed English  Book  of  Common  Prayer ;  but  for  taste, 
fitness  and  literary  felicity  they  are  such  as  one  would 
expect  a  household  like  the  elder  Stevenson's  to  accept 
with  sympathy.  One  can  easily  believe  that  so  fastid- 
ious an  artist  of  word  and  phrase  as  the  son  would 
have  been  loath,  even  for  purposes  of  religion  and  with, 
whatever  glamour  of  parental  inheritance,  to  use  a 
book,  as  he  evidently  used  this  one,  which  did  not  pos- 
sess value  of  text  as  well  as  of  tone.  Albeit  the 
orthodoxy  of  the  volume  is  soundly  old-fashioned,  there 

276 


Stevenson's 

is  naught  of  the  cheap  and  common  to  offend  the 
taste. 

One  also  notes  the  frequent  work  of  the  pencil, 
dividing  off  portions  of  a  particular  prayer  as  of  special 
worth  or  application;  and  this  expression  of  preference 
is  interesting.  A  little  examination  shows  that  the 
impromptu  editor,  whether  father  or  son,  has  invari- 
ably chosen  what  was  most  happy  in  manner  or  noblest 
in  thought  and  feeling.  Several  times,  for  example, 
in  an  invocation  for  the  welfare  of  the  family,  the  al- 
lusion to  the  servants  is  stricken  out.  Thus :  "  Bless 
the  members  of  this  household.  May  they  walk  be- 
fore Thee  with  a  perfect  heart.  May  the  young  be 
enabled  to  adorn  the  doctrine  of  God  their  Saviour 
in  all  things.  May  the  servants  be  enabled  to  live  out 
and  act  the  lofty  motto,  '  We  serve  the  Lord  Christ.'  " 
The  final  sentence  is  erased.  Again,  in  another 
prayer,  the  text  reads:  "Bless  us  who  are  now 
surrounding  Thy  foot-stool,  whether  as  master  or 
servants " ;  and,  as  before,  the  final  clause  is  pen- 
ciled through. 

Does  this  mean  that  in  the  Edinburgh  home  the 
kitchen  folk  were  not  bidden  into  the  fore-room  wor- 
ship; or  that  Stevenson  down  in  the  Samoan  Islands, 
with  his  dusky  servitors  around  him,  did  not  wish  to 
use  the  servile  word?  For  it  is  not  unlikely  that  this 
book  was  commonly  read  in  the  Vailima  house  before 
its  master  had  indited  his  own  prayers,  or  that  they 
were  merely  supplementary  to  it.  Whatever  be  the 
277 


Xittie  I600a^0  in  ^literature  an&  Xife 


truth,  there  is  a  pleasant  thought  in  the  avoidance  of 
the  word  suggestive  of  servitude. 

Full  of  interest  to  the  student  of  literature  are  the 
occasional  comments  and  corrections  that  look  to  an 
improvement  in  the  form  of  these  printed  prayers;  just 
what  we  might  have  expected  from  Stevenson,  whose 
ear  was  so  sensitive  to  the  subtleties  of  English  speech. 
We  should  not  wish  the  author  of  the  "  Christmas 
Sermon,"  "  Prince  Otto  "  and  "  Weir  of  H-ermiston  " 
to  overlook,  even  in  the  mood  of  essential  imploration, 
the  distinction  between  "  shall  "  and  "  will,"  "  should  " 
and  "  would  "  —  a  distinction,  by  the  way,  which  the 
modern  newspaper  is  rapidly  obliterating  from  the 
public  consciousness. 

It  has  been  said  that  the  Scotch,  as  compared  with 
the  English,  are  insensitive  to  this  difference  in  speech 
forms;  an  idea  which  the  student  of  historical  English 
can  easily  rebuke  and  which  the  habit  of  the  finest 
Scotch  writers  —  Scott,  Burns,  Carlyle,  and  Stevenson 
—  shows  to  be  unsound.  Certainly  Stevenson  was  as 
exquisitely  responsive  to  such  nuances  of  style  as  is  the 
highly  trained  musician  to  close  harmonies.  In  three 
places  he  has,  plainly  in  his  own  hand,  stricken  out  of 
the  word  "  would  "  the  initial  letter  and  substituted 
the  letters  necessary  to  make  it  "  should  "  ;  thereby 
changing  a  mood  of  volition  to  one  of  conditional 
futurity,  where  the  latter  was  clearly  the  intention  of 
the  pious  framer  of  the  prayers.  It  is  characteristic 
of  Stevenson  to  take  offense  at  this  little  jar,  one  of  the 

278 


Stevenson's  f>raset>:Boofe 

imperfections  of  expression  which,  it  may  be  feared, 
many  to-day  even  of  the  writing  craft  could  have  let  go 
by  without  a  protest  —  and  small  wonder  in  view  of 
the  shoddy  English  dinned  incessantly  into  our  ears! 
It  will  do  no  harm  to  quote  these  passages  that  the 
illustrations  in  their  altered  form  may  be  before  the 
reader : 

"  Had  it  not  been  for  this  inconceivable  stoop  from 
the  infinite,  where  should  we  have  been  this  day?  "  A 
little  reflection  will  show  that  conditional  futurity,  not 
modified  willing,  is  what  the  prayer-book  means  to 
convey,  and  therefore  "  should  "  is  alone  correct.  And 
again:  "Were  we  to  be  judged  by  the  duties  and 
doings,  the  sins  and  shortcomings,  of  any  one  day  of 
the  passing  year,  we  should  be  righteously  condemned." 
Here  the  intended  expression  of  futurity  is  secured  by 
the  change.  Once  more  in  the  sentence:  "Where 
should  we  be  at  this  hour,  O  God"  etc.,  the  pious 
author  wished  merely  to  imply  futurity,  not  desire, 
hence  Stevenson's  substitution  is  perfectly  sound.  The 
interesting  point  in  the  three  cases  is,  we  may  reiterate, 
the  indication  that  even  in  what  may  be  called  the  non- 
literary  mood,  the  trained  ear  and  the  nice  taste  of  the 
great  essayist  and  story-maker  could  not  abide  false 
notes. 

Several  other  changes  or  interpolations  are  likewise 

of  interest.     In  one  case  the  text  reads :     "  We  come 

anew  on  this  the  evening  of  Thy  Holy  Day,"  and  there 

is  an  insertion  after  "  We  come  "  to  make  it  read : 

279 


Xittle  Bssass  in  ^literature  an&  t&ife 

"  We  come  before  Thee,"  the  gain  in  correctness  be- 
ing obvious;  here  the  instinct  of  the  stylist  is  again 
at  work. 

A  grossly  careless  passage  which  is  set  right  is  the 
following:  "Let  each  feel  that  we  have  some  work 
to  perform  " ;  the  amended  reading,  of  course,  being : 
"  Let  each  feel  that  he  has,"  etc.  And  in  another 
place,  where  the  original  runs:  "  May  they  repose 
their  bleeding  bosoms  on  Him  " —  which  smacks  of 
the  crude  anthropomorphic  imagery  of  the  older 
theology  —  the  objectionable  words,  "  their  bleeding 
bosoms,"  are  erased. 

These  are  the  only  emendations,  and  the  small  num- 
ber testifies  in  itself  to  the  generally  admirable  style 
of  this  manual  for  family  worship  which  was  so  long 
in  the  Stevensons'  possession.  The  book  had  to  run 
a  double  gauntlet,  for  Thomas  Stevenson,  too,  was  a 
man  of  most  fastidious  literary  taste. 

How  we  would  like  to  have  revealed  to  us  the  com- 
plete history  of  the  little  brown  book!  What  stories 
it  might  tell  of  father,  son  and  mother,  of  gray  Edin- 
burgh, of  the  long  wash  of  Pacific  waves,  of  all  the 
shine  and  color  and  alien  charms  of  Vailima,  if  only 
its  now  yellow  pages  might  murmur  of  the  past.  But 
it  is  something  to  possess  it,  to  feel  sure  that  it  was 
handled,  carried,  often  used  by  the  man  who  has  be- 
come to  many  of  us  something  more  than  a  distin- 
guished writer,  one  of  the  chief  ornaments  of  late  Vic- 
torian literature ;  "  that 's  the  world's  side."  To  the 
280 


Stevenson's 

true-blue  Stevenson  he  is  a  friend  and  brother,  lis- 
tening to  whose  vibrant  voice  we  are  moved  to  deep 
love,  and  braced  by  whose  sane  and  winsome  doctrine 
of  life  we  can  face  the  struggle  unflinchingly,  and  with 
a  high  heart. 


281 


Barrie  an&  tbe  Baronetc? 

BARRIE  and  a  baronetcy!  Somehow  they  don't 
seem  to  belong.  The  whimsical,  dear,  gifted  fel- 
low whose  plays  and  stories  have  stirred  the  imagina- 
tion, roused  the  wholesome  laughter  and  moved  the 
sympathies  of  countless  English  folk,  can  be  thought 
of  not  so  easily  as  Sir  James.  In  truth,  a  man  of 
genius  —  and  the  author  of  "  Auld  Licht  Idyls,"  "  The 
Little  Minister "  and  "  Peter  Pan "  is  surely  that 
—  always  looks  a  little  odd  and  out  of  place  when  the 
world's  conventional  honors  come  his  way. 

A  Scotch  writer  whom  one  thinks  of  along  with 
Scott,  Carlyle,  Burns,  and  Stevenson,  does  not  quite 
appear  to  sit  in  the  same  galley  with  the  rich  brewers 
and  mayors  of  country  towns  who  nowadays  are  so 
frequently  knighted  in  England. 

But  softly!  Barrie  has  been  made  a  baronet,  not 
a  mere  knight,  which  is  a  different  matter.  The 
title  becomes  hereditary  and,  like  Tennyson,  Barrie 
can  hand  on  the  handle  to  his  name,  if  he  have  male 
issue. 

Nor,  in  spite  of  the  cheapening  of  honorary  titles  in 
England  of  late  years,  should  it  be  forgotten  that  to 
designate  an  author  in  this  way  means  a  desire  upon 
282 


3Barrie  an&  tbe  Baronetcy 

the  part  of  his  country  to  show  appreciation  of  his 
service :  it  is,  too,  a  recognition  of  the  art  of  literature, 
for  which  he  stands,  and  to  refuse  it  might  be  churlish, 
for  this  reason.  Those,  therefore,  who  blame  Barrie 
—  if  any  such  there  be  —  for  accepting  the  dignity 
should  reflect  that  it  does  not  mean  a  lack  of  democratic 
spirit  in  him.  Writers  before  him  have  declined  like 
honors,  it  is  true.  Carlyle,  the  peasant  born,  did  so, 
as  you  may  know  by  visiting  his  house  in  Chelsea, 
where  are  hung  the  letter  of  Beaconsfield  tendering 
the  bauble  and  the  Scotchman's  manly  and  modest  re- 
fusal. Lord  Tennyson  who,  when  he  accepted  his 
elevation  to  the  peerage,  was  bitterly  assailed  by  some 
on  the  ground  that  he  was  far  greater  as  plain  Alfred 
Tennyson  than  as  Lord  Tennyson,  First  Baron  of 
Aldworth-Farringford,  twice  declined  the  prime  min- 
ister's tender  of  similar  honors,  and  only  yielded  when 
he  was  made  to  believe  that  his  action  was  a  personal 
grief  to  his  sovereign,  Victoria,  whom  he  admired  and 
loved, —  as  the  dedication  of  the  "  Idyls  of  the  King  " 
bears  witness. 

And  yet,  and  yet,  for  the  life  of  me  I  cannot  glibly 
think  "  Sir  James  "  when  I  think  Barrie.  Peculiarly 
is  it  so  in  this  case.  Glad  as  we  may  be  that  his 
country  has  recognized  what  we  all  knew  before, — 
that  he  is  one  of  the  few  authentic  and  beneficent  forces 
in  letters  among  living  men, —  there  remains  a  feeling 
not  so  easy  to  define,  but  strong  in  its  insistence,  that 
a  title  to  the  name  of  the  man  who  wrote  "  Margaret 

283 


Xtttie  Essa$0  in  ^literature  and  Xffe 

Ogilvie  "  is  not  fitting,  or  at  least  does  not  fit.  And  I 
seem  to  detect  two  traits  in  Barrie's  work  which  en- 
gender this  feeling. 

One  of  them  is  the  simple,  unfeigned,  beautiful  sym- 
pathy for  humble  folk  —  the  folk  of  his  own  early 
life  —  set  forth  in  such  works  as  "A  Window  in 
Thrums"  and  "  Auld  Licht  Idyls."  Just  as  George 
Eliot  did  her  best  work  in  "  Adam  Bede  "  and  "  The 
Mill  on  the  Floss,"  when  she  went  back  to  her  child- 
hood memories  and  described  the  country-folk  of  War- 
wickshire, her  first  home,  so  Barrie,  recalling  rural 
Scotland  with  its  kale-yard  setting  and  quaint,  canny, 
enjoyable  characters,  gives  us  of  his  best  and  best  loved. 
He  is  so  sensitively  human,  so  democratic,  so  of  the 
people  and  with  them,  that  titles,  or  whatever  gewgaws 
of  pride,  seem  rather  absurd  when  associated  with  him. 

Then,  again,  not  only  is  there  something  simple  and 
democratic  in  Barrie,  but  his  genius  —  especially  in  its 
most  mature  manifestations  —  has  in  it  a  quality  of  the 
shy  and  aloof:  it  is  whimsical,  almost  elfish  at  times, 
with  a  fairy  touch  and  a  delightful  irresponsible,  un- 
grown-up  mood, —  the  child  mood  of  "  Peter  Pan  "  and 
many  another  phantasy.  Such  a  writer  seems  not  of 
this  world  and  its  fashion  but,  rather,  belongs  in  the 
Land  of  Heart's  Desire  and  the  distant  country  of 
our  lost  innocence.  The  folk  of  his  imagination  are 
the  winsome  creatures  of  romance,  all  the  truer  that 
they  walk  not  in  daylight  streets  under  the  garish  sun 
but  inhabit  our  minds  for  "  a  dream  while  or  so,"  as 
284 


Barrie  ant)  tbe  Baronetcy 

dear  Charles  Lamb  would  say.  It  would  be  a  shock 
to  come  back  from  Wenty  to  hear  the  butler  in 
a  Mayfair  drawing-room  announce:-  "  Sir  James 
Barrie!" 

The  same  humor  and  delicate  poetry  get  into  the 
later  plays  that  deal  with  more  ordinary  mortals  than 
those  of  fairy  lore.  You  feel  it  in  "  The  Admirable 
Crichton,"  with  its  sly  suggestion  that  a  man  's  a  man, 
though  he  be  a  butler, —  if  once  you  put  him  where  he 
can  exhibit  his  manhood.  It  crops  out  in  the  charming 
"  What  Every  Woman  Knows,"  where  woman's  im- 
memorial power  of  divination  is  hinted  and  mere  man 
in  his  solemn  obsession  with  the  practical  is  good- 
humoredly  made  fun  of.  You  get  it  again  in  the  por- 
trait of  the  absent-minded  scholar  in  "  The  Professor's 
Love  Story,"  which  so  wholesomely  reminds  us  of  the 
lovableness  of  a  type  too  often  sneered  at  as  ill  adjusted 
to  the  demands  of  daily  life.  There  is  nothing  in 
modern  literature  finer,  purer  and  more  salutary  than 
the  fun  of  this  same  Barrie,  as  keen  of  brain  as  it  is 
warm  and  sweet  of  heart. 

This  expresses  something  of  the  impulse  of  objec- 
tion that  springs  to  mind  as  we  read  the  news  and 
know  that,  being  dubbed  baronet  and  as  a  loyal  sub- 
ject of  the  King,  Barrie  will  hereafter  take  unto  him- 
self such  honors  and  appellations  as  inhere  in  the 
position.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  the  title  will  not  be 
appended  to  his  name  upon  the  title-page  of  his  books: 
for  he  knows,  no  man  better,  that  his  literary  fame 

285 


3Lfttle  Essays  in  Xfterature  anfc  Xife 

is  far  more  to  the  world,  in  these  days  of  deeds,  than 
any  official  naming  he  may  receive.  He  knows  his 
fellow-men  will  love  and  honor  him  for  the  gentle 
teaching,  the  wise  thinking  and  the  tender  rending  of 
human  hearts  which  have  come  from  his  pen,  not  for 
any  place  or  post  the  prime  minister  may  bestow.  He 
is  also  aware  that  neither  Burns  nor  Carlyle  nor  Steven- 
son, his  great  fellow-Scots,  received  nor  needed  such- 
like compliments:  that  a  peer  of  literature  does  full 
as  much  for  the  world  as  any  peer  of  church  or  state. 
Indeed,  the  reflection  may  as  likely  as  not  have  given 
him  pause  ere  he  signified  his  acceptance  of  the  re- 
ward. 

However,  he  took  it,  and  must  not  be  blamed,  since, 
as  I  have  said,  he  may  have  wished  to  encourage  the 
recognition  of  letters  in  his  person,  a  principle  wise 
and  worthy  to  establish.  "  They  who  have  shall  re- 
ceive." Already  he  possessed  all  that  a  noble  name  for 
writings  that  charm,  enliven  and  elevate  can  bring  an 
author.  Let  him  take  the  ribbon  "  to  wear  on  his 
coat,"  if  but  to  remind  Philistines  that  literature  counts 
in  the  eyes  of  the  English  government.  And  so,  hail 
to  Sir  James,  and  may  his  days  be  many  in  the  land  he 
has  blessed! 


286 


Brownings 

THE  recent  death  of  Barrett  Browning,  only  child 
of  Elizabeth  and  Robert  of  that  ilk,  sets  me  a- 
brooding  upon  the  Browning  house.  The  son  did 
not  live  up  to  the  hopes  of  his  parents  and  almost 
inevitably  suffered  from  the  comparison  with  his  gifted 
father  and  mother,  two  mighty  poets  of  English  race 
and  speech.  We  can  be  gentle  with  his  memory,  for 
he  left  us  an  excellent  portrait  painting  of  Robert; 
moreover,  he  was  placed  all  his  life  in  the  hard  posi- 
tion natural  to  the  offspring  of  a  sire  so  distinguished. 
There  is  sadness  in  the  thought  that,  physically  at 
least,  the  family  perishes  with  this  son,  Barrett.  But 
a  second  thought  chases  it  away:  the  family  name  is 
safely  embalmed  in  the  amber  of  pure  poetry,  and 
those  twins  of  immortality,  Robert  and  Elizabeth 
Browning,  will  give  it  a  fragrant  meaning  among  Eng- 
lish-speaking people  for  many  generations  to  come. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  Robert  Browning, 
who  arrived  late,  is  now  generally  regarded  as  a  major 
English  poet,  disputing  with  Tennyson  alone  the  title 
of  leading  singer  of  the  second  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  Landor's  words  might  be  applied  to  him: 
"  I  shall  dine  late,  but  the  room  will  be  well  lighted 

287 


3Littie  Bssass  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xife 


and  the  guests,  though  few,  select."  Long  laughed  at 
and  neglected,  Browning  lived  to  see  himself  a  fashion, 
almost  a  fad.  He  will  never  be  a  popular  poet,  it 
may  be  confessed;  but  the  days  of  slighting  are  no 
longer  possible.  We  now  see  clearly  that  he  was  a 
poet  of  creative  genius  and  the  first  important  English 
bard  to  incorporate  into  his  work  the  modern  realistic 
method  and  view-point,  freely  introducing  the  gro- 
tesque, homely,  terrible  and  absurd  elements  of  human 
life  and,  moreover,  suiting  his  style  to  this  purpose, 
and  hence  shocking  criticism  at  first  and  holding  back 
the  general  appreciation  of  his  power  and  significance. 
That  he  won  at  last  is  due  to  more  than  the  fact 
that  he  was  strong  enough  to  impose  his  view  upon  the 
world;  he  conquered  also  because  his  view  was  that 
sure  to  come  with  the  modern  interpretation  of  the 
relation  of  art  to  life.  He  expressed  the  Zeitgeist,  in 
other  words.  Any  man  who  sums  up  the  spirit  of  the 
time  in  this  way  possesses  a  power  that  is  more  than 
personal. 

That  Browning  was  not  always  a  poet  in  his  work, 
but  rather  a  heady  metaphysician,  must  be  conceded, 
unless  we  wish  to  rank  ourselves  with  those  mistaken 
enthusiasts  who  have  given  the  phrase,  "  Browning 
Society,"  humorous  connotation.  "  Sordello  "  is  not 
a  great  nor  a  successful  poem,  let  the  moon-eyed 
specialist  cosset  it  in  a  corner  as  he  will.  Nor  is  the 
poet's  alleged  obscurity  the  mere  imagining  of  the 
Philistine;  muddy  he  is  at  times,  both  as  to  manner 
288 


Ube 

and  matter;  it  is  foolish  to  deny  it,  and  only  hurts  the 
true  appreciation  of  the  man  who  wrote  "  Evelyn 
Hope  "  and  "  Andrea  del  Sarto  "  and  "  Love  Among 
the  Ruins  "  and  "  Saul  "  and  many  a  masterpiece  more. 
Browning  might  well  have  breathed  the  prayer: 
"  God  save  me  from  my  friends,"  since  it  is  they  who 
are  likely  to  do  him  most  harm. 

The  world  at  large  has  decided  to  overlook  the  eccen- 
tricities and  forgive  the  faults,  because  of  the  fine, 
stirring  message  of  the  man,  and  the  splendid  singing 
moods  that  came  to  him;  moods  that  sang  him  to  the 
very  top  of  his  time.  The  worth-whileness  of  life, 
the  fact  that  it  is  a  spiritual  battle-ground  and  the 
development  of  soul  its  one  success, —  Browning  never 
tired  of  telling  this  to  his  fellow-men,  and  in  doing  so 
he  handled  human  material  dramatically,  that  is,  in 
terms  of  the  struggle  necessary  when  characters  clash 
and  crises  come.  To  read  him  understandingly  is  to 
drink  a  rich  cordial  that  warms  the  heart  and  braces 
the  muscles  for  noble  action.  He  is  one  of  the  Eng- 
lish poets  who  had  message  as  well  as  music,  and  who 
loved  life  even  more  than  literature. 

What  of  his  wife,  the  shy,  elusive,  delicate  figure 
at  his  side,  the  two  together  offering  us  the  most  ideal 
union  in  the  whole  range  of  native  letters?  Where 
shall  we  place  her,  forgetting  for  the  moment  that  she 
was  the  woman  beloved  by  Robert,  snatched  from  an 
invalid's  couch  to  fly  to  Italy  with  him,  there  to  have 
those  fifteen  wonderful  years  of  heavenly  comradeship 

289 


OLittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  Xite 

with  each  other  and  with  the  Muse  ?  That  she  helped 
him  beyond  computation,  we  know  from  "  One  Word 
More,"  "  By  the  Fireside,"  the  superb  invocation  in 
"  The  Ring  and  the  Book,"  to  name  no  more. 

Often,  in  criticism,  she  is  patronized ;  called,  for  ex- 
ample, "  the  best  of  English  poetesses,"  an  offensive 
word  and  an  offensive  attitude  of  mind;  for  Mrs. 
Browning  is  either  a  great  English  poet  or  she  is  not, 
and  it  is  altogether  unnecessary  to  introduce  sex  into 
the  discussion.  One  critic  had  no  doubt  as  to  her 
quality, —  her  husband.  "  I  am  only  a  painstaking  fel- 
low," he  said,  "  but  she  has  genius."  Too  modest,  this, 
with  respect  to  himself,  beyond  question,  and  charm- 
ingly chivalrous;  but  as  a  judgment  upon  Elizabeth 
Barrett,  poet,  it  is  sound  and  sane.  Genius  she  surely 
had,  and  whatever  her  technical  faults  —  technically 
she  is  as  open  to  criticism  as  is  her  husband  —  this 
tiny,  frail  woman  had  in  her  the  divine  fire  and  will, 
I  believe,  in  the  end  be  awarded  a  very  high  place  in 
the  English  anthology.  It  is  significant  that  when, 
in  the  middle  nineteenth  century,  the  post  of  poet- 
laureate  fell  vacant,  and  the  succession  was  being  dis- 
cussed, Mrs.  Browning  was  mentioned  as  a  natural 
candidate,  Robert  Browning  not  at  all.  It  was  after 
he  had  injured  his  reputation  by  "  Sordello  "  and  other 
injudicious  pieces;  but  the  opinion  in  which  Mrs. 
Browning  was  held  is  plain. 

That  opinion  was  justified,  and  is.  If  the  man 
wrote  great  love  poetry  inspired  by  the  woman,  so  did 
290 


TTbe  Brownings 

she  to  express  her  exaltation  of  happiness  when  she 
found  that  he  was  hers.  For  the  voicing  of  pure  yet 
passionate  feeling  between  the  sexes,  the  "  Sonnets  from 
the  Portuguese  "  have  never  been  surpassed  in  English 
song.  Shakspere,  Rossetti,  Meredith, —  name  the 
great  sonnet  sequences  as  you  may,  you  can  find  noth- 
ing to  place  before  the  Portuguese  series  for  white-hot 
spiritual  power.  They  constitute  the  final  and  supreme 
word  in  the  lovers'  lexicon.  After  all,  had  Mrs. 
Browning  done  naught  else,  she  would  be  among  the 
few  lyric  singers  of  England. 

Her  other  work  is  notable.  The  noble  patriotism 
of  "  Casa  Guidi  Windows,"  the  piercing  social  note  of 
"The  Cry  of  the  Children,"  the  wealth  of  intellect 
and  feeling  in  "  Aurora  Leigh,"  and  the  rapturous 
lyric  movement  of  a  dozen  poems,  of  which  "  The 
Great  God  Pan"  and  "The  Nightingales"  are 
familiar  examples, —  all  stamp  this  woman  bard  as  one 
divinely  called  to  song,  one  who  possessed  depth  and 
breadth  and  height  along  with  sweetness.  Fit  mate 
she  was  for  the  other,  in  song  as  in  life,  and  together 
they  must  go  down  in  the  annals  of  English  poetry. 


291 


IReputation  an&  IRevoarfc  in  letters 

GENERALLY  speaking,  reputation  and  reward 
go  hand  in  hand,  and  one  likes  to  feel  that  in 
the  best  of  all  possible  worlds  it  is  ever  so.  In  the 
history  of  literature,  however,  there  is  much  to  con- 
tradict this  amiable  belief.  Genius  goes  unappreciated 
till  long  after  it  is  departed;  a  pittance  is  paid  for  a 
creation  eventually  of  wide  fame;  and  Grub  Street  is 
the  habitation  of  those  who  ply  the  pen.  Milton  sells 
"  Paradise  Lost "  for  five  pounds,  Otway  starves  to 
death,  Chatterton  dies  in  a  garret,  and  Goldsmith  lies 
abed  because  he  cannot  pay  for  his  laundry.  The 
literary  biography  of  the  race,  and  of  all  races,  is  full 
of  such  pictures. 

Doubtless  the  reason  that  the  practical  person  —  Ar- 
nold's Philistine  —  has  been  in  the  habit  of  looking 
askance  at  artists  and  litterateurs  lies  just  here:  they 
have  not  been,  speaking  by  and  large,  well  paid,  at  least 
promptly,  in  their  lifetime.  Now  the  world  in  general, 
regarding  art  and  literature,  judges  it  by  its  pay,  as  it 
judges  every  man.  Nor  can  this  view  be  brushed  aside 
with  a  sneer.  Truth  to  tell,  it  is  the  instinct  of  com- 
mon-sense as  well  as  of  convenience  to  estimate  a  con- 
tribution by  the  money  it  fetches.  It  is,  for  one  thing, 
292 


"Reputation  ant)  IRewarfc  tn  ^Letters 

a  simple,  tangible  and  quick  way  to  ascertain  worth. 
And,  moreover,  behind  the  test  is  the  sensible  assump- 
tion that  if  a  man's  work  is  of  use  to  society  it  will  be 
paid  for  in  proportion.  Even  in  art,  says  the  Philistine 
(mark  his  "  even  "),  if  a  poem  goes  a-begging  or  a  pic- 
ture hangs  neglected  in  the  studio,  it  means  that  it 
lacks  utility  for  mankind  and  so  has  no  raison  d'etre. 

There  is  argument  in  this  and  it  establishes  an  excuse 
for  the  maker  of  beauty  in  any  art  to  hold  his  work 
and  himself  dear  and  not  to  cheapen  himself  and  it  by 
giving  it  away  or  selling  it  for  a  song.  Let  him  re- 
member that  while  the  connoisseur  may  appreciate  his 
output,  whatever  the  world's  immediate  reception  of  it, 
the  generality,  whom  he  must  depend  upon  for  his  liv- 
ing, will  judge  by  his  sales  and  his  prices. 

If  the  poet  forms  the  habit,  with  Silas  Wegg,  of 
dropping  into  poetry,  coyly  refers  to  his  work  as  "  a 
poor  thing,  but  mine  own,"  and  always  acts  as  if,  sur- 
prised with  a  piece  of  verse  upon  his  person,  he  were 
caught  with  stolen  goods,  it  is  highly  probable  that  the 
world  will  hold  his  service  light,  taking  him  at  his  own 
valuation. 

But  whatever  be  the  attitude  of  the  maker  of  litera- 
ture, pseudo-modest  or  egoistically  eulogistic,  it  is  still 
true  that  masterpieces  win  their  way  slowly,  so  far  as 
general  appreciation  goes,  and  often  do  not  get  a  fair 
hearing  in  their  own  day.  Posthumous  fame  is  the 
award  of  some  of  the  world's  greatest.  It  is  the  ex- 
ception when  a  Kipling  at  twenty-five  finds  himself  of 
293 


OLittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  %ife 

international  fame;  few  mortals  can  have  the  pleas- 
urable sensation  of  a  Byron  on  waking  up  on  a  certain 
morning,  while  he  was  still  under  thirty,  to  find  himself 
famous,  and  can  echo  his  own  words,  "  O  the  days  of 
our  youth  are  the  days  of  our  glory." 

Nor  when  the  recognition  comes,  early  or  late,  does 
it  as  a  rule  bring  with  it  anything  in  a  financial  way 
commensurate  either  with  similar  success  in  other  fields, 
or  with  the  time  and  energy  devoted  to  the  fulfilment 
of  the  task.  One  naturally  thinks  of  poetry  in 
illustrating,  since  it  is,  by  confession,  the  highest  form 
of  literary  utterance.  How  many  poets  have  made 
themselves  rich  or  even  gathered  together  a  modest 
sufficiency?  Few,  indeed.  The  legend  that  makes 
Homer  a  poor  minstrel  is  the  allegory  for  all  his  kind. 
Tennyson,  to  be  sure,  had  a  large  income  for  many 
years  and  the  prices  paid  him  late*  in  his  life  were  so 
generous  that  to  study  his  case  alone  would  be  most 
misleading.  But,  more  often,  decent  poverty  or  out- 
and-out  indigence  has  been  the  singer's  lot.  Of  course, 
Bohemian  habits  and  personal  faults  of  character,  as 
with  a  Villon  or  a  Poe,  have  been  factors  in  the  result ; 
but  quite  as  often  the  cause  has  been  the  slow  spread- 
ing of  the  news  that  here  was  that  elusive  thing  called 
genius. 

Whittier  surely  was  a  poet,  one  of  the  major  Ameri- 
can bards  by  critical  consent  to-day,  nor  could  he  be 
called  a  man  unsuccessful  in  the  pursuit  of  the  muse; 
on  the  contrary,  he  was  a  people's  poet,  with  all  that 
294 


IReputation  an&  IRewarfc  in  betters 

implies  of  popular  applause  and  pelf.  Yet  on  his 
death,  when  Amesbury  discovered  he  had  left  a  mod- 
erate fortune  of  something  over  one  hundred  thousand 
dollars,  the  town  was  rather  taken  aback;  it  had  sup- 
posed he  had  accumulated  much  less,  and  felt  per- 
sonally aggrieved  that  the  poet  had  not  been  more  fre- 
quently solicited  for  civic  contributions.  Whittier 
escaped,  because  he  belonged  to  the  clan  which  was 
rated  as  honorably  poor.  The  prizes  of  prose  are  bet- 
ter, it  may  be  granted;  but  even  in  the  case  of  ac- 
credited writers  of  fiction  and  drama,  the  rewards  are 
in  most  cases  exaggerated,  and  the  shining  returns  only 
sporadic.  Bernard  Shaw,  frankest  of  men  when  he  so 
chooses,  tells  us  that  during  his  first  nine  years  in 
London,  after  he  went  there  as  a  young  fellow  of 
twenty  to  win  fame  and  fortune,  he  made  just  six 
pounds,  a  trifle  mote  than  three  dollars  a  year! 

In  the  light  of  these  reflections,  the  question  nat- 
urally arises:  what  is  the  incentive  to  induce  genius 
to  enter  the  field  of  imaginative  creation,  when  the  re- 
turn is  so  slow  and  uncertain  and  small?  And  the 
reply  is  ready:  the  joy  of  doing  it,  and  the  inward 
sense  of  contributing  that  which  in  the  end  is  uni- 
versally acknowledged  as  of  highest  worth  to  the  cause 
of  civilization.  From  time  out  of  mind,  men  have 
been  willing  to  forego  comfort  and  luxury,  to  endure 
neglect  and  even  abuse,  and  to  bide  their  time  until 
belated  recognition  come,  in  order  to  express  their 
dreams  and  rejoice  in  the  creative  fervor  of  making 
295 


Xittle  Essays  tn  ^Literature  atto  SLife 

beauty.  And  in  the  quest  they  are  sustained  by  the 
indisputable  fact  that  just  in  proportion  as  a  nation 
becomes  enlightened,  do  their  efforts  get  their  due 
meed. 

Although  money  is  the  most  commonly  accepted 
standard  whereby  to  measure  worth,  part  of  the  re- 
ward in  the  case  of  the  maker  of  art,  and  a  very  ap- 
preciable and  important  part,  is  derived  from  his  stand- 
ing in  society  whenever  and  wherever  that  society  is 
sufficiently  evolved  to  know  the  higher  values.  He 
commands  a  consideration,  a  respect  and  often  a  social 
precedence  which  money  cannot  buy.  He  becomes 
aware  that  in  the  strict  economic  sense  he  is  a  citizen 
whose  service  to  the  community  is  of  value,  and  is  so 
estimated  by  his  fellow-citizens.  And  he  gets  his  pay, 
in  large  measure,  in  this  way  rather  than  in  a  cash 
consideration. 

In  spite  of  an  apparent  anomaly,  the  reward  fol- 
lows the  service  here  as  elsewhere,  and  a  causal  con- 
nection may  be  seen  between  the  two.  The  hardship 
of  waiting  so  long  for  appreciation  is  compensated  for 
by  the  quality  and  permanence  of  the  reward  when  it 
arrives. 


296 


©U>*]fa0bicme&  Diew  of  Hrt 

WHEN  I  asked  Andrew  Lang,  in  London,  what 
he  thought  of  Arnold  Bennett,  he  replied  in  ap- 
parent seriousness,  looking  the  while,  after  his  wont, 
obliquely  down  on  the  floor,  "  I  never  heard  of  him." 

The  answer  was,  whimsical,  a  sort  of  protest  against 
the  intricate  matter-of-factness  of  Bennett's  method. 
It  was  also  the  speaker's  way  of  donning  a  protective 
armor  against  an  undesirable  subject.  Alas,  I  may 
never  know,  since  the  lips  of  the  man  who  spoke  the 
words  are  stopped  with  dust  and  silent  forever.  But 
in  any  case,  the  repudiation  of  realists  and  all  their 
works  by  a  writer  who  believed  in  and  throughout  his 
days  stood  for  romance,  points  a  moral.  Lang  was 
completely  out  of  sympathy  with  the  current  school 
of  "  average  life  "  painters;  from  his  admirable  arsenal 
of  wit,  wisdom  and  eloquence  he  was  continually  draw- 
ing weapons  of  warfare  against  them.  Like  his  dear 
friend  and  fellow-Scot,  Stevenson,  he  thought  it  the 
business  of  letters  to  present  a  world  somewhat  brisker 
and  brighter  than  one  finds  it  in  the  dead-and-alive 
succession  of  ordinary  days. 

He  reveled  in  the  past  because  it  afforded  a  gen- 
erous opportunity  for  the  display  of  the  more  pictur- 
esque aspect  of  human  life;  in  melodrama,  because  it 
297 


Xfttle  Essays  in  ^literature  a^  SLifc 

contains  the  poetry  of  action;  in  historic  characters 
like  the  Scotch  Mary,  for  the  reason  that  whatever 
may  have  been  her  faults,  she  was  never  dull  and  drab 
and  commonplace.  And  so  when  he  confided  to  me 
his  ignorance  of  the  very  existence  of  the  author  of 
"The  Old  Wives'  Tale,"  and  later  added  that  he 
thought  John  Galsworthy's  name  should  have  been 
"  Glumsworthy,"  I  smiled  and  understood. 

The  old  order  passeth,  and  the  men  who  felt  as  did 
Lang,  and  James  Payn  and  Walter  Besant  and 
Stevenson, —  to  mention  no  more  of  the  elders, —  are 
fast  leaving  the  stage,  or  have  already  made  their  final 
exit.  Even  as  Villon,  in  his  immortal  ballade,  asks, 
"Where  are  the  snows  of  yester  year?"  so  we  may 
soon  be  asking,  Where  are  the  romantics  of  yesterday? 
Lang  himself  was  too  vital  and  versatile,  altogether  too 
resourceful  and  amusing,  to  seem  to  lag  superfluous  on 
the  literary  board,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  his 
position  toward  his  art  and  toward  life  as  well  has  an 
effect  of  dating  from  an  earlier  period. 

The  question  is,  Which  is  right?  Shall  we  defend 
Bennett  when  he  analyzes  the  mental  state  of  Hilda 
Lessways,  or  Rider  Haggard  as  he  writes  of  "  She  "? 
Shall  we  prefer  the  James  metaphysics  to  the  Conan 
Doyle  plot-tangle?  Shall  we  let  an  author  lie  to  us 
about  life,  if  only  he  amuse  us  in  the  meantime? 
These  be  very  pertinent  queries,  in  view  of  the  mod- 
ern drift  of  literature,  the  rival  claimants  and  the  re- 
sounding clash  of  opposing  creeds. 
298 


TTbe  ©Ifc^ffasbionefc  IDiew  of  Hrt 

It  will  be  wholesome  at  the  outset  to  acknowledge 
that  in  most  cases  the  personal  equation  will  settle  the 
matter.  Those  who  like  the  "  penny  dreadful "  in 
the  astute  hands  of  a  Stevenson  will  read  it,  let  the 
critics  cry  as  they  will.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
devotee  of  James  will  continue,  despite  all  ridicule,  to 
find  satisfaction  in  the  subtlest  probings  of  the  most 
gentlemanly  of  modern  minds.  People  simply  will  not 
be  reasoned  into  an  opinion.  And  it  is  perhaps  quite 
as  well  that  this  personal  latitude  exists;  it  makes  for 
variety,  which  is  the  spice  for  criticism.  But  grant- 
ing this,  there  is  no  harm  in  pointing  out  that  both 
sides,  the  Langites  and  anti-Langites,  have  something 
of  right  on  their  side. 

Literature  is  both  for  profit  and  pleasure  and  it  is  its 
business  to  show  us  grim  facts  as  well  as  gracious 
alleviation.  It  is  neither  true  to  depict  it  as  all  gray 
nor  as  all  purple,  to  represent  human  lives  as  one  long 
torture  or  as  a  sort  of  perpetual  high  jinks.  Some 
writers  become  especially  interested  in  showing  the 
heat  and  burden  of  the  day;  that  is  the  modern  tend- 
ency, on  the  whole.  Others  like  to  remind  us  of  the 
nights  when  the  moon  makes  magic  of  daytime  hum- 
drum and  when  music  fills  the  air  and  love  talks  her 
own  dear  language.  And  these  can  never  become  an- 
tiquated, because  they  not  only  are  dealing  with  certain 
facts  of  life,  but  facts  that  are  extremely  agreeable, 
since  most  folk  prefer  that  moonlit  hour  to  the  hour 
on  the  stock  exchange,  in  the  department  store  or  on 
299 


Xittle  Essags  in  literature  aito  %ife 

the  trolley  car.  The  trouble  really  begins  when  one 
or  the  other  view  becomes  arrogant  and  exclusive:  the 
portrayer  of  the  lyric  moon  asserting  that  there  is  no 
garish  light  of  day,  or  the  defender  of  workaday 
things  scoffing  at  the  mood  of  night  skies  and  the  soft 
witcheries  of  the  demi-dark.  In  an  ideal  state  these 
two  phases  of  life  should  blend  and  justice  be  done  to 
both;  practically  and  as  a  rule,  one  or  the  other  is  em- 
phasized far  out  of  proportion  to  its  importance. 

It  has  been  at  once  the  failing  and  the  virtue  of  this 
generation,  in  literature,  that  it  has  developed  such  a 
passionate  zest  in  representing  the  common  and  unclean 
as  to  slight  (for  a  season  at  least)  the  high  and  the 
holy.  The  original  instinct  to  do  this  was  democratic, 
altruistic,  noble,  but  in  its  cultivation  came  abuse,  and 
a  habit  was  formed  which  in  extreme  cases  makes  the 
avoidance  of  beauty  almost  a  cult.  The  difference 
between  the  merely  pretty  and  the  nobly  beautiful  is 
lost  sight  of,  and  much  space  given  the  spectacle  of 
innumerable  clever  young  persons  trying  their  best  to 
be  mournful  and  ugly  and  tedious  for  the  alleged  edi- 
fication of  the  world  of  readers,  who  really,  at  this 
juncture,  do  not  read. 

Therefore,  to  assume  a  patronizing,  half-contemptu- 
ous attitude  toward  the  Lang  view  is  silly  and  shallow 
in  the  extreme.  The  counterview,  the  view  so  prev- 
alent in  letters  any  time  during  the  last  thirty  years, 
is  capable  of  monstrous  exaggerations  and  has  led  to 
some  of  the  most  pernicious  literature  that  has  ever 
300 


©U>*ifasbicmefc  ItHew  of  Hrt 

bamboozled  man.  If  one  has  to  choose  between  the 
two,  on  the  assumption  that  literature  must  be  either 
instructive  and  unpleasant  or  delightful  and  naughty, 
one  would  very  sensibly,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  select  the 
latter.  For  the  art  of  letters,  like  all  other  arts,  is 
primarily  for  the  pleasure  of  the  world,  and  joy  is  its 
own  excuse  for  being. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  no  such  dilemma  exists.  A 
sound  piece  of  literature  may,  and  often  does,  afford 
the  gratification  proper  to  a  work  of  art,  while  at  the 
same  time  it  teaches  us  about  life,  enlarges  us  mentally, 
and  spiritually  uplifts  us.  Indeed,  it  is  a  test  of  real 
literature  —  in  contrast  with  the  spurious  and  second- 
class  kind  —  that  it  performs  this  double  service,  do- 
ing us  good,  even  as  it  makes  us  happy.  The  greatest 
novelist  who  has  ever  lived,  Balzac,  remarks  in  the 
preface  to  one  of  his  most  wonderful  books,  "  Le  Pere 
Goriot,"  that  the  writer  of  fiction  should  depict  the 
world  not  only  as  it  is  but  "  a  possibly  better  world." 
That  is  the  proper  ideal  for  all  artists  and  it  is  the 
younger  school's  failure  to  realize  and  recognize  the 
truth  of  it  which  irked  Andrew  Lang.  All  honor  to 
his  memory. 


301 


St  Hugusttne  anb  Bernard  Sbaw 

THERE  is  irony,  it  would  seem,  in  bracketing  the 
two  names:  the  great  scholar-saint  of  the  past 
and  the  arch  iconoclast  and  satirist  of  the  present. 
Certainly,  their  views,  even  as  their  times,  seem  as  far 
apart  as  the  Arctic  and  Antarctic  Circles. 

St.  Augustine,  among  other  convictions,  believed  in 
a  personal  devil  and  made  an  excellent  argument  for 
his  faith.  Shaw  believes  in  the  life  force  and  the 
eventual  Superman:  for  him,  deity  and  devil  alike  are 
depersonalized,  existent  but  in  the  mind  of  man. 
Here  indeed  are  thinkers  at  the  antipodes  of  thought. 

Yet  are  they  curiously  in  agreement  on  certain  essen- 
tials of  conduct  and  conviction.  In  his  recent  noble 
play,  "  The  Shewing  Up  of  Blanco  Posnett,"  in  which 
we  may  forgive  the  inaccuracy  of  the  American  setting 
for  the  sake  of  the  clear  spiritual  meaning  of  the 
drama,  Shaw  lets  his  horse  thief  and  would-be  black- 
guard, Posnett,  make  a  remarkable  discovery.  He  has 
tried  hard  to  be  a  "  bad  man,"  after  the  approved 
Bret  Harte  formula;  and  he  deemed  he  would  suc- 
ceed. He  has  stolen  a  horse  —  crime  of  crimes  on 
the  plains  in  the  old  days  —  and  is  making  his  "  get- 
away." And  lo!  just  because  a  woman  with  a  sick 
302 


St.  Hugustine  an£>  JSernart)  Sbaw 

child,  whom  he  encounters  in  his  flight,  needs  his  horse 
that  she  may  ride  post-haste  for  a  doctor  and  so  save 
her  girl,  he  dismounts,  gives  up  the  beast,  and  so  is 
caught  and  haled  back  for  a  Judge  Lynch  trial. 
His  neck  is  in  the  noose  when  we  see  him  in  the 
climax.  But  he  offers  the  assembled  court  a  piece  of 
his  mind,  hanging  or  no  hanging,  for  he  has  made  a 
very  remarkable  discovery,  he  opines.  He  finds  —  in 
his  own  language  —  that  there  are  two  games  being 
played  in  this  world :  a  rotten  game  and  a  Great  Game. 
He  started  out  to  play  the  former,  but  along  came  the 
woman  in  her  plight  and  somehow,  he  hardly  knows 
how  or  why,  he  could  not  play  the  game  that  is 
"  rotten  " ;  he  had  to  play  the  Game  that  is  "  Great." 
And  he  declares,  in  the  pungent  idiom  of  his  type, 
that  it  "felt  bully,  just  bully."  "And  so,  gents,"  he 
decides,  "  I  'm  for  the  Great  Game,  every  time."  He 
has  got  the  "  rotten  feel  "  off  him  for  once,  and  he 
never  wants  it  on  him  again.  As  Stevenson  would  put 
it,  he  is  doomed  to  nobility. 

The  complete  change  of  terminology  must  not  blind 
us  to  the  unchanging  recognition  here  of  the  "  not  our- 
selves that  makes  for  righteousness,"  as  Arnold  phrases 
it.  Poor  Blanco  seems  a  far  cry  from  medieval 
theology,  but  both  Shaw  and  St.  Augustine  acknowl- 
edge, after  all,  the  two  opposing  principles  that  are  in 
life :  the  powers  we  personify  under  the  names  God  and 
the  Devil.  And  this  western  rough  testifies  in  his 
fashion  to  the  something  in  man  which  cleaves  unto 
303 


Xittie  Essays  in  ^literature  an&  SLife 

the  one  and  abhors  the  other.  Behind  whatever 
nomenclature  and  above  all  creeds  is  the  basic  fact. 
Theologies  are  fluctuant,  but  they  all  strive  to  ex- 
press the  same  thing.  Deity,  say  some,  First  Cause, 
say  the  scientists;  they  but  seek  to  describe  the  one 
mystery. 

Some  call  it  evolution, 
And  others  call  it  God, 

sings  a  modern  poet  in  a  poem  that  is  often  quoted  be- 
cause it  voices  a  widespread  interest  and  attitude  to- 
day. A  modern  like  Shaw  refuses  to  give  a  name  to 
that  inside  him  which  fills  him  with  a  peace  that  still 
passeth  understanding  when  he  is  true  to  his  highest 
instincts.  And  the  important  thing  is  that  the  feeling 
is  there  and  the  man  able  to  respond  to  it;  and  hence 
still  a  living  spirit. 

The  Great  Game  cannot  be  denied  by  any  sane  crea- 
ture: man  is  so  made  that  he  can  never  quite  forget 
it.  He  may  play  the  other  game  for  a  lifetime  and 
even  at  times  think  it  is  the  only  one.  But  sooner  or 
later,  in  a  flash,  under  pressure,  in  sorrow,  or  perhaps 
when  he  is  most  at  ease,  comes  the  call,  and  he  be- 
comes suddenly  aware  that  it  is  his  particular  business 
to  play  the  Great  Game,  and  nothing  else. 

Men  do  not  disagree  fundamentally  on  these  mat- 
ters; they  dispute  over  terms  rather  than  spiritual 
realities.  In  the  matter  of  definitions,  no  two  mortals 
could  offer  a  more  striking  contrast  than  Shaw  and  St. 
304 


St.  Buaustine  anfc  Bernard  Sbaw 

Augustine.     But  in  their  belief  in  the  Great  Game, 
they  "  are  brothers  under  the  skin." 

It  is  this  sense  of  underlying  unity  which  is  drawing 
human  beings  together  in  these  days,  irrespective  of  all 
intellectual  differences.  Augustine  considered  it  the 
primary  business  of  a  man  to  save  his  soul:  Bernard 
Shaw  would  carefully  avoid  the  theologic  word  "  soul," 
and  would  declare  it  to  be  man's  main  affair  to  assist 
society  —  that  is,  his  brother  man  —  in  a  development 
which  shall  flower  forth  in  the  Superman  —  a  step 
toward  the  saint  of  the  religionist.  And  they  are  only 
engaged  with  two  sides  of  the  same  desire,  conception, 
ideal:  growth  toward  the  highest,  which  is  God. 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  Irish  socialist-wit  would 
dodge  compromising  words  like  "  soul,"  "  conscience  " 
and  "  duty,"  he  acknowledges  them  practically  all  the 
same, —  indeed,  is  a  very  slave  to  their  implications,  be- 
ing in  his  fundamental  attitude  toward  life  a  Puritan 
of  the  Puritans,  a  preacher  of  the  truth  as  he  sees  it, 
who  cannot  be  comfortable  while  he  perceives  his  fel- 
low-beings complacently  going  wrong. 

It  is  a  solemn  thought  to  consider  how  much  of  the 
terrible  warfare  induced  by  the  intellectual  quibblings 
of  theologians  and  philosophers  might  have  been 
avoided  if  only  men  had  got  together  on  the  essentials 
and  realized  that  they  differed  in  the  main  on  terms 
and  the  definitions  thereof.  Many  deaths  have  come  of 
definitions:  the  torture  rack  and  the  fagot  flame  are 
its  children. 

305 


Xtttle  j£5sa£3  in  ^literature  anfc  Xife 

"  What  is  your  religion,  Dr.  Johnson?  "  asked  an  in- 
quisitive lady  of  the  mighty  lexicographer,  god  of  the 
eighteenth  century  coffee-house. 

"  The  religion  of  all  sensible  men,  madam,"  was  the 
ambiguous  reply. 

"  But  what  religion  is  that?  "  persisted  the  lady. 

"  That,  madam,  is  what  all  sensible  men  keep  to 
themselves,"  said  the  doctor,  which  was  his  way  of 
suggesting  that  she  mind  her  own  business.  If  we  had 
all  minded  our  business,  historically,  in  this  great  mat- 
ter, what  a  deal  of  misery  had  been  spared  the  children 
of  men!  And  incidentally,  how  much  nearer  the 
Millennium  should  we  be!  "One  person  I  have  to 
make  better,  myself,"  quoth  Stevenson.  "  My  duty 
to  others  may  be  described  by  saying  that  I  must  try 
to  make  my  neighbor  happy." 

When  all  is  said  and  done,  man  has  an  odd  way  of 
appearing  equal  to  himself  down  through  the  ages. 
He  has  grown,  expanded,  improved  with  the  centuries, 
granted.  But  in  his  deepest  emotions  and  instincts 
there  is  a  family  resemblance  between  the  cave  man  and 
Meredith's  Sir  Willoughby,  the  egoist.  He  needk 
something  to  worship  still,  as  he  needed  it  then  —  and 
he  finds  it  in  Nature  without  or  within  himself,  at  his 
best. 


306 


jg&ucatton 


" 


ffemtntsatton"  of  Culture 


SOME  time  ago  the  writer  attended  a  class  in  Eng- 
lish literature  at  the  University  of  California, 
conducted  by  one  of  the  ablest  and  most  brilliant  of 
the  younger  professors  of  that  institution.  There  were 
fifty  persons  in  the  room,  of  whom  just  six  were  men. 
If  an  investigator  were  to  take  the  trouble  to  go  up 
and  down  the  land,  gathering  statistics  in  our  colleges 
and  universities  where  co-education  is  the  system,  he 
would  find  this  proportion  constant,  the  local  varia- 
tions not  being  sufficient  to  modify  the  rule.  The 
literary  courses  everywhere  are  followed  by  so  large  a 
percentage  of  women  as  to  justify  the  remark  of  a 
University  of  Chicago  professor  of  English,  that  he 
might  as  well  be  teaching  in  a  woman's  college.  Fre- 
quently, in  periodicals  nowadays,  complaint  is  heard 
of  the  "  feminization  "  of  education  and  of  culture. 
A  recent  essay  by  a  well-known  specialist,  published  in 
the  Atlantic  Monthly,  will  serve  to  illustrate  a  com- 
mon attitude.  The  fine  arts  are  feminine,  the  sciences 
masculine,  it  was  argued  by  this  evidently  disturbed 
mind  ;  the  men  are  taking  the  concrete  subjects  and  the 
practical  courses,  whereas  the  women  elect  and  prefer 
those  that  are  esthetic,  cultural,  gentle  and  inspirational 
309 


SLfttle  E00a£8  fn  Xtterature  an&  Xife 


rather  than  hardheaded  and  utilitarian.  So,  too,  some 
critics  become  alarmed  at  the  predominance  of  women 
teachers  in  the  public  schools;  and  are  equally  aroused 
over  the  fact  that  here  and  there  a  woman  even  oc- 
cupies a  college  chair.  It  is  a  dubious  compliment, 
surely,  to  the  sex  to  imply  that  the  educational  influ- 
ence it  brings  to  bear  upon  boys  is  in  some  mysterious 
way  such  as  to  be  deleterious  and  namby-pamby. 

Is  it  a  sound  valuation  of  literature  and  its  pursuit 
which  regards  it  as  a  kind  of  educative  frill  or  indul- 
gence, well  enough  after  the  really  important  branches 
have  been  acquired;  and  especially  fitted  for  women 
because  traditionally  they  have  had  more  time  to  pursue 
them?  Is  Sarah  Battle's  attitude  the  right  one,  when 
that  estimable  lady  declared  that  a  book  was  for  re- 
laxation after  the  main  business  of  the  day,  her  game 
of  whist,  was  despatched?  Or  is  it,  contrariwise,  a 
sign  of  that  topsy-turvy  conception  of  education  in 
its  proper  gradations  which  places  as  of  first  importance 
those  divisions  of  learning  less  vital  in  the  all-round 
development  of  a  human  being  into  his  highest  powers? 
If  culture  be  a  mere  frill  and  lady-like  accomplish- 
ment, like  dancing,  embroidery,  and  languages  in  the 
eighteenth  century  ideal,  then  must  we  reconstruct  the 
history  of  thought  and  reverse  the  opinion  of  thinkers 
from  Aristotle  to  Arnold  and  Emerson. 

It  may  at  least  be  suggested  that  the  cry  of  "  femi- 
nization  "  over  the  terrible  sight  of  ninety  per  cent,  of 
women  in  all  the  literary  classes  of  the  country  where 
310 


Ube  "jfeminiaatton"  of  Culture 

both  sexes  gather,  could  be  interpreted  to  mean  that  the 
men,  misled  by  false  ideals  of  education,  are  staying 
away  from  an  influence  which  they  particularly  need, 
as  a  corrective  of  so  much  that  is  useful  in  the  practical 
sense  but  not  educative  at  all  in  the  higher  meaning  of 
the  word.  And  also,  it  may  be  added,  is  it  an  influence 
which  they  value  at  its  true  worth  and  significance 
whenever  and  wherever  right  ideals  of  life,  education, 
and  human  nature  obtain. 

The  cheap  and  insulting  talk  about  "  feminization  " 
is  a  quite  unnecessary  slap  in  the  face  and,  moreover 
obscures  the  whole  vastly  vital  question.  It  directs  at- 
tention to  the  wrong  end  of  the  problem,  and  darkens 
counsel  generally.  The  final  status  of  any  nation  will 
be  won  in  exact  proportion  as  it  trains  its  citizens  in 
that  higher  activity  whic'h  shall  result  in  the  free  and 
helpful  use  of  all  the  faculties :  and  these  are,  the  brain 
to  comprehend,  the  hand  to  perform  the  brain's  behest, 
and,  above  and  crowning  all,  the  feelings  quick  to  re- 
spond to  the  noblest  stimuli  and  the  soul  capable  of  ap- 
preciating beauty  and  righteousness.  To  turn  this  up- 
side down  and  make  mere  utility  the  apex  is  to  train 
slaves  instead  of  free  and  fine  human  beings. 

If  women  in  latter-day  America  are  keeping  alive 
the  cultural  in  education,  all  honor  to  them  as  con- 
servators in  a  time  of  need.  It  does  not  mean  in  them 
an  instinct  for  the  decorative,  as  some  supinely  seem  to 
imagine,  but  a  truer,  deeper  and  finer  realization  of 
what  education,  rightly  defined,  in  reality  is  and  ever 


Xtttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  xtfe 

will  be.  Their  view  of  it  is  enlightened  and  the  con- 
trary view  belongs  in  Boeotia,  not  in  the  land  we  love. 
There  is  ironic  humor  in  the  spectacle  of  men  worry- 
ing about  "  feminization  "  and  patronizing  the  other 
sex  which  likes  "  effeminate  "  studies,  when  the  very 
studies  thus  stigmatized  are  the  studies  they  them- 
selves need  in  order  to  avoid  a  lopsided  development 
and  to  use  in  the  training  of  the  nation  if  we  would 
not  have  our  civilization  half-baked. 

Woodrow  Wilson,  whose  literary  accomplishments 
are  for  the  time  submerged  in  his  political  activities,  has 
paid  his  compliments  to  this  absurdly  crass  notion  of 
culture  in  his  penetrating  paper  entitled  "  Mere 
Literature."  All  who  believe  that  literature  offers 
itself  primarily  as  a  kind  of  plaything  for  women  are 
recommended  to  read  this  for  more  and  much-needed 
light. 

In  view  of  the  rapidly  changing  position  of  woman 
in  modern  society,  it  may  well  happen  that  within  an 
appreciable  time  no  need  will  longer  exist  to  slur  the 
sex  by  the  opprobrious  use  of  words  such  as 
"  effeminate,"  "  feminine,"  "  womanish,"  where  the  ac- 
companying sneer  is  but  half-suppressed.  It  is  prob- 
able that  just  as  the  obnoxious  word  "  female,"  used  so 
freely  less  than  a  century  ago  to  designate  the  gentler 
sex,  has  pretty  much  disappeared  from  the  vocabulary 
of  good  society  and  is  relegated  to  its  application 
in  references  to  the  lower  animals,  so  these  others  will 
in  turn  perish  from  polite  usage,  except  as  they  carry 
312 


ttbe  "ffemfnfjation"  of  Culture 

with  them  a  more  gracious  connotation.  It  may  even 
be  that  such  a  phrase  as  the  "  feminization  of  culture," 
so  far  from  awakening  terror  in  the  timorous  bosom 
of  the  masculine  educator,  may  become  an  honorable 
term  of  praise,  not  reproach,  and  be  taken  to  imply 
what  is  a  fact  now,  and  will  be  then:  that  it  has  been 
given  to  women  to  see  clearer  in  this  great  matter  of 
education.  They  refuse  to  put  the  cart  before  the 
horse;  and  when  they  show  marked  preferences  for 
the  study  of  letters  and  music  and  art  as  branches  of 
learning,  they  offer  the  world  an  object-lesson  in  rela- 
tive values  and  the  proper  purpose  of  civilization. 

The  protracted  discussion  will  have  served  its  pur- 
pose if,  after  the  smoke  of  battle  has  cleared  away,  it 
can  be  seen  a  little  plainer  than  before  that  the  spirit 
is  more  than  bread;  that  a  specific  intellectual  attain- 
ment is  only  the  beginning  of  an  education  in  the 
broad,  genial  and  noble  sense.  The  culture  that  makes 
character,  that  is  the  aim;  and  contact  with  the  best 
that  has  been  thought  and  said  in  the  world,  which  is 
Arnold's  definition  of  literature,  will  not  produce 
weaklings,  but  rather  the  citizens  which  are  a  nation's 
proudest  asset. 


313 


Culture,  "Cuicbab"  an& 
Common  Sense 

IT  is  wonderful,  the  tyranny  of  a  word.  Pro- 
nounce "  culture  "  as  if  it  were  spelt  "  culchah," 
and  the  laugh  or  sneer  follows,  expressive  of  the  con- 
temptuous attitude  of  mind.  It  may  even  be  doubted 
if  the  dignified  and  noble  conception  which  lies  behind 
Arnold's  famous  use  of  this  noun  does  not  in  the  minds 
of  many,  or  most,  carry  with  it  an  idea  not  helpful  to 
its  welfare.  The  facetious  spelling,  in  truth,  but 
registers  that  fact.  What  is  there  of  opprobrium  in 
its  significance?  Why  do  plain  people  look  a  little 
askance  when  "  culchah  "  enters?  If  an  injustice  is 
done  the  word,  and  what  it  stands  for,  we  should  know 
it  and  rectify  our  mistake.  If  there  be  some  reason  for 
the  view  or  feeling,  culture  should  be  made  aware  of 
the  criticism  and  strive  to  mend  her  ways. 

The  Murray  Dictionary,  that  master  scholar  work 
of  our  time  now  fast  moving  towards  completion  after 
a  generation  of  devoted  labor  from  thousands  of  spe- 
cialists, does  us  all  the  service  of  indicating  the  first  use 
of  any  word  in  the  tongue,  with  the  quotation  embody- 
ing it.  In  the  case  of  "  culture,"  one  finds  that  it 
came  into  our  speech  in  1483,  when  Caxton,  forever 
3H 


Culture,  "Culcbab"  an&  Common  Sense 

famed  as  the  man  who  introduced  printing  in  England, 
wrote :  "  When  they  depart  from  the  culture  and 
honor  of  their  God."  In  the  early  seventeenth  century 
we  find  Hobbes  speaking  of  the  Lacedaemonians  and 
"  the  culture  of  their  bodies."  Later,  the  word  is  ap- 
plied to  the  development  of  mind  and  manners,  as  in 
education.  And  out  of  this  comes  the  modern  idea  of 
refinement. 

Plainly,  one  may  see  in  this  evolution  of  meaning 
the  notions  of  worship,  of  training,  and  of  particular 
emphasis  upon  the  refining  elements  of  education.  The 
narrowing  of  the  idea  to  the  esthetics,  the  use  of  the 
word  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  it  in  contrast  with  the 
more  masculine  training  which  makes  character  and 
best  fits  a  man  for  contact  with  life,  is  evidently  a  sec- 
ondary development,  due  to  historical  reasons  and, 
more  than  anything  else,  arising  from  a  misunderstand- 
ing of  culture  and  its  misuse  in  the  hands  of  various 
foolish  disciples,  who,  some  of  them  vicious,  but  more 
often  simply  shallow  and  silly,  brought  disrepute  upon 
a  noble  conception  and  confused  the  minds  of  many 
naturally  sympathetic  to  the  ideal  of  culture. 

The  silly  caricature  of  culture  is  answerable  for 
much  of  this  disestknation  of  a  noble  thing.  A  bril- 
liant young  Oxford  man,  Oscar  Wilde,  came  to  this 
land  to  lecture  years  ago.  He  carried  a  flower  in  his 
hand,  wore  his  hair  long  and  his  silk  breeches  short; 
in  other  words,  played  the  fool  for  the  notoriety  there 
was  in  it.  He  posed  in  the  dim  light  of  London  draw- 
315 


Xfttle  Essays  in  ^literature  a^  Xife 

ing-rooms  until  his  kind  of  estheticism  became  a  cult 
and  Wilde  a  seven  days'  social  wonder. 

On  the  more  serious  side,  Walter  Pater  was  cited  as 
one  of  the  apostles  of  the  movement,  to  call  it  such,  for 
the  refined  paganism  of  his  essay  attitude.  That 
clever,  though  now  well-nigh  forgotten,  skit,  "  The 
Green  Carnation,"  anonymous  at  the  time,  but  now 
known  for  the  work  of  Hichens,  humorously  caught 
some  of  the  types  of  this  temporary  spasm  of  pseudo- 
esthetics,  and  kept  alive  the  rancor  of  the  Philistine, 
—  a  name  coined,  by  the  way,  by  Matthew  Arnold  to 
designate  the  hard-headed  citizen  to  whom  all  this 
side  of  life  was  an  abomination.  Big,  splendid  Wil- 
liam Morris,  even  he  was  implicated  somewhat,  since 
he  revolutionized  the  decorative  art  of  England,  mak- 
ing the  industrial  beautiful  and  applied  art  in  Eng- 
land endurable.  As  part  of  the  general  tendency  may 
be  mentioned  the  pre-Raphaelites  of  painting  and  the 
later  impressionism ;  "  isms "  buzzed  like  flies  in  the 
air,  and  the  very  titles  of  novels  in  the  eighties  were  of 
esthetic  metaphor,  drawn  from  music  or  painting: 
"  In  the  Key  of  Blue,"  and  the  like.  The  esthetic  was 
also  applied  to  the  culture  of  the  body,  and  Delsarte 
had  his  vogue,  an  influence  by  no  means  yet  dead. 

What  was  good  of  all  this  has  remained,  what  were 
fashion  and  folly,  pose  and  pretense  have,  as  a  matter 
of  course,  died  the  death.  To  confuse  the  two  is  un- 
fair, but  not  unnatural,  since  mankind  in  general 
judges  hastily  and  catches  its  ideas  on  the  run.  But 

316 


Culture,  "Culcbab"  an&  Common  Sense 

we  need  to  repeat  a  saying  by  a  Latin  author  some  two 
thousand  years  dead :  "  The  abuse  of  a  good  thing  is 
nothing  against  the  thing."  As  well  judge  Ibsen  by 
the  fools  who  think  he  advocates  misery  for  misery's 
sake,  as  well  identify  Browning  with  the  devotees 
who  make  puzzles  out  of  his  poems,  as  regard  the 
Wilde  cult  as  a  true  representation  of  culture.  No, 
it  was  "  culchah  "  instead,  because  of  the  insincerity 
that  crept  into  a  chase  of  the  beautiful. 

Culture  in  the  true  sense,  then,  is  manly  for  men  and 
womanly  for  women.  It  means  nothing  more  nor  less 
than  such  harmonious  training  of  the  faculties  of  a 
human  being,  always  in  relation  to  the  environment,  as 
shall  make  for  a  higher  type  of  civilization.  Culture 
in  distinction  from  education  (if  any  real  opposition 
exists)  implies  more  than  definite  preparation  for  the 
lifework;  it  is  a  genial  rounding  out  of  a  person  for 
the  purpose,  not  of  wage  alone  but  for  the  general 
uses  of  living. 

We  might  sum  it  up  in  saying  that  it  means  an  un- 
derstanding of  Beauty  and  a  love  for  it ;  Beauty  being 
that  harmony  and  peace  in  the  nature  of  things  which 
denote  principles  of  existence,  which  is  in  the  universe 
both  physical  and  psychic,  in  the  swing  of  the  cos- 
mos and  the  mind  of  men.  To  limit  so  magnificent 
a  thought  to  the  petty  confines  of  effeminate  and  modish 
manners  is  exquisitely  absurd.  The  Beauty  that 
is  esthetic,  always,  in  its  right  uses,  merges  into  the 
Beauty  that  is  spiritual ;  along  with  those  other  eternal 
317 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  anfc  %ife 

principles,  the  Good  and  the  True,  a  trinity  that  saves 
the  world. 

And  whenever  or  wherever  culture  is  despised,  and 
the  change  of  spelling  or  pronunciation  occurs  as  a 
sign,  you  may  rest  assured  that  the  reason  is  not  far 
to  seek:  it  is  a  narrow  and  utilitarian  concept  of  edu- 
cation. To  grab  facts,  to  acquire  mental  powers  and 
make  oneself  of  use  as  a  small  but  efficient  part  of  the 
great  machine  of  modern  activity  is  a  good  thing, 
never  to  be  contemned;  but  it  is  not  culture,  nor  is  it 
education,  for  that  matter,  in  any  broad  sense  and 
proper  definition.  Culture  exists  to  supplement  all 
such  partial  and  unlovely  training.  Without  it,  no 
nation  could  hold  up  her  head  among  her  sisters,  the 
civilized  peoples  of  earth.  With  it,  although  her 
borders  be  not  far  apart  and  her  standing  army  small, 
her  head  may  be  held  high  and  honor  and  respect  be 
hers  from  the  children  of  men. 

Matthew  Arnold  wrought  valiantly  to  make  this 
view  obtain,  to  cry  up  what  he  called  Hellenism,  the 
gospel  of  sweetness  and  light.  It  is  one  of  history's 
sardonic  jests  that  he  has  been  so  often  misunderstood, 
and  that  culture  should  be  lightly  regarded.  We  must 
not  sting  the  hand  that  nourishes  us. 


318 


Speecb 

ENGLISH  speech  has  constantly  to  fight  the  en- 
croachments of  vulgarity.  One  of  the  objects 
of  education  in  language  is  to  furnish  standards  by 
which  the  new  locution,  which  is  legitimate,  is  tried* 
and  the  inadmissible  applicant  of  the  gutter  is  rejected. 

By  hearing  the  best  English  in  the  right  sort  of  home 
and  listening  to  it  on  the  lips  of  those  who  mingle  in 
society,  and,  as  well,  by  constant  contact  with  it  in 
the  finest  writers,  past  and  present,  one  gradually  comes 
to  an  instinctive  sense  of  good  usage  which  is  far 
superior  to  the  brain-born  rules  of  grammar,  whose 
value  may  be  conceded  within  limitations. 

All  the  while  and  everywhere,  as  I  said,  the  assaults 
of  shoddy  English  are  taking  place,  and  what  is  true  of 
the  life  spiritual  is  true  of  the  life  linguistic:  one  must 
fight  for  the  victory  of  purity  and  Tightness,  or  right- 
eousness, which  is  the  same  thing  with  a  different 
spelling.  Not  only  are  the  ignorant  always  with  us 
to  pull  down  the  standard  of  speech,  but  the  vicious  do 
it,  too,  in  their  use  of  sundry  dialects  to  be  understood 
in  the  underworld,  not  of  dictionary  repute  or  civilized 
acceptance.  Hordes  of  foreigners  as  well,  Zangwill's 
fifty  peoples  from  as  many  lands,  intelligent  often  and 
319 


Xtttle  Essays  tn  ^literature  an&  Xife 

earnestly  desirous  of  learning  the  usages  of  good  Eng- 
lish, are  uncertain  of  the  native  idioms  of  their  adop- 
tive tongue  and,  while  acquiring  it,  manufacture  all 
sorts  of  enormities,  so  that  a  Myra  Kelly,  a  Montague 
Glass,  or  an  O.  Henry  find  occasion  for  much  humor 
in  reporting  the  mistakes  and  malformations  of  our  im- 
ported citizens  in  the  school,  on  the  street,  in  the  home 
or  in  the  innumerable  associations  of  work.  Thus, 
the  school  and  college  have  an  exceptionally  difficult 
task,  in  a  country  like  the  United  States,  to  correct 
wrong,  train  the  young  in  the  way  they  should  go,  and 
counterbalance  the  influence  of  the  general  destructive 
forces  so  potent  to  nullify  what  they  seek  to  instil  in 
the  way  of  right  usage. 

The  problem  would  be  made  simpler  than  it  is  if 
there  were  one  kind  of  English  proper  for  all  occa- 
sions. This  is  not  so  at  all.  The  language  written 
and  the  language  spoken  differ,  for  example,  in  a  cer- 
tain degree.  The  latter,  the  life-giving  element  of 
speech,  is  less  formal,  quicker  to  change,  more  vernacu- 
lar and  unconventional;  when  we  write,  we  naturally 
and  properly  adopt  a  tone  more  sedate,  more  formal, 
less  broken  and  nervous  with  the  vibration  of  life. 
Yet,  if  we  go  too  far  and  make  the  written  word 
stilted  and  so  far  removed  from  actuality  as  to  seem  un- 
natural, we  defeat  the  object  in  view,  which  is  to  give, 
to  a  form  more  carefully  wrought  and  fuller  of  the 
niceties  impossible  to  the  rapid  methods  of  spoken 
language,  an  elegance  and  precision  not  otherwise  to  be 
320 


Speecb 

attained.  As  the  virtue  of  the  spoken  word  is  radical 
and  makes  for  vitality,  so  that  of  the  written  is  con- 
servative and  makes  for  beauty  and  art.  The  adjust- 
ment of  the  two  to  the  uses  of  living  is  no  easy  thing, 
and  only  the  past  masters  of  expression  come  to  a  com- 
mand of  English  resources  so  that  their  spoken  words 
have  the  finish  of  the  printed  page  and  their  writing 
the  easy,  off-hand  grace  and  charm  of  the  vernacular. 

Then  again,  English  suitable  for  use  for  one  purpose 
or  for  one  association  is  not  necessarily  advisable  for 
another.  To  give  a  familiar  illustration,  the  idiom  of 
business  is  by  no  means  that  of  polite  society.  Human 
beings  modify  their  speech  in  social  relations  from 
what  it  is  in  the  office  or  on  'change,  even  as  they  affect 
another  mode  of  dress.  Yet  business  jargon  constantly 
tries  to  push  its  way  into  circles  where  it  has  no  right. 
A  man  downtown  speaks  of  meeting  a  "  party  "  on  an 
important  matter ;  and  his  wife  —  shudder  not,  I  have 
heard  it  —  declares  at  the  dinner-table  the  same  even- 
ing that  her  husband  is  detained  by  a  "  party  "  in  the 
city.  It  is  the  other  kind  of  party  she  should  be  in- 
terested in,  let  us  agree. 

Take  the  ubiquitous  and  awful  word  "  proposition." 
Used  at  first  in  business  circles  and  perhaps  needed  there, 
it  has  waxed  so  arrogant  that  you  hear  it  on  every  side, 
wherever  two  or  three  are  gathered  together.  "  That 's 
a  different  proposition  "  is  sickeningly  familiar  to  the 
jaded  ear,  and  may  be  now  taken  to  refer  to  anything 
from  a  comparison  of  the  beauty  of  women  to  a  state- 
321 


3Little  JEssass  in  ^Literature  an& 


ment  of  a  new  turn  in  the  Balkan  imbroglio.  Can 
you  imagine  Dr.  Holmes  or  James  Russell  Lowell  say- 
ing it  ?  A  "  Society  for  the  Suppression  of  *  Proposi- 
tion '  "  —  save  in  its  proper  meaning  and  place  — 
should  be  formed,  with  a  membership  made  up  of  all 
who  retain  the  feeling  for  sound  English  usage. 

In  the  same  fashion,  each  and  every  sport:  baseball, 
football,  racing  —  what  you  will  —  has  its  special 
lingo,  and,  not  content  with  using  it  for  its  own  pur- 
poses, would  ask  us  to  enlarge  the  general  vocabulary 
to  include  its  racy,  not  to  say  horse-racy,  expressions. 
It  takes  a  long  and  enthusiastic  devotion  to  the  cause 
to  read  with  full  appreciation  the  talk  of  the  gentle- 
men of  the  press,  whose  duty  it  is  to  keep  us  posted 
concerning  the  national  game.  For  vigor  and  vitality 
it  is  often  admirable,  and  it  surely  possesses  that  in- 
describable but  unmistakable  sense  of  humor  which  is 
one  of  our  proudest  American  assets.  At  the  same 
time,  it  is  not  quite  the  English  of  sobriety  and  sweet 
savor  which  those  who  know  regard  as  best  worth 
while. 

So  delicate  are  these  distinctions  that  it  may  even  be 
asserted  that,  on  the  spoken  side,  there  is  a  speech  for 
men  and  another  for  women.  A  vigorous  use  of  idiom 
suits  the  male  handler  of  English  which  may  not  be 
at  all  well  for  the  other  sex.  The  girls  in  school  and 
college  who  ape  the  masculine  in  this  respect  and  deem 
it  the  last  note  of  modernity  to  talk  "  an'  they  were 
men  "  are  hard  to  endure,  either  as  users  of  speech  or 
322 


Spcccb 

as  human  beings.  For  them,  silence  is  indeed  golden. 
It  is  one  of  the  peculiar  dangers  of  co-education  that,  in 
addressing  classes  nominally  considered  as  units,  the 
teacher  of  language  is  really  talking  to  two  sets  of 
people,  whose  instinct  with  regard  to  speech  uses  should 
differ  even  as  does  their  sex.  It  would  be  as  absurd  to 
claim  that  an  idiom  fit  for  the  one  is  necessarily  as  fit 
for  the  other,  as  to  expect  an  Englishman  to  speak 
French  like  a  Parisian. 

So  the  incessant  vulgarization  goes  on,  and  we  should 
be  in  a  very  bad  way  indeed  —  much  worse  off  than  we 
are  —  were  it  not  happily  true  that  purifying  influ- 
ences are  also  steadily  at  work:  a  vast  body  of  noble 
literature  acting  as  a  tremendous  safeguard  against 
corruption ;  and  the  presence  of  a  large  number  of  per- 
sons—  small,  to  be  sure,  in  relation  to  the  whole 
population,  but  authoritative  out  of  proportion  to  their 
number  —  so  trained  to  speak  the  tongue  that,  in  pub- 
lic and  in  private,  they  act  as  the  conservators  of  a 
language  which  for  some  twelve  centuries  has  em- 
bodied in  suitable  form  the  choicest  thought  and  feel- 
ing of  our  race. 


323 


Current  B&ucational  H&eals 

ALL  through  June  the  word  "  education "  is 
dinned  into  one's  ears  until  it  is  pardonable  if 
impatience  at  its  mere  mention  is  bred  in  the  mind  of 
man.  Up  and  down  the  land  young  folk  have  been 
or  are  being  graduated,  and  sundry  wise  men  —  or 
women  —  are  addressing  them  on  the  difference  be- 
tween school  and  life,  the  proper  relation  of  the  vari- 
ous aspects  of  human  endeavor,  and  the  meaning  and 
use  of  mental  and  moral  development.  Wisdom  has 
been  rife  and  the  very  air  has  buzzed  with  pedago- 
gic theories.  It  is  a  comfort  to  reflect  that  the  schools 
and  colleges  have  ceased  from  troubling  for  a  season, 
that  vacation  is  on,  and  the  strain  and  stress  are  tem- 
porarily over.  If  a  superfluity  of  talk  about  educa- 
tion were  tantamount  to  getting  it,  few  would  escape 
knowledge  in  these  recent  days  of  universal  exploitation 
of  educational  ideals.  All  the  same,  few  words  used 
by  mortals  are  still  of  looser  significance,  more  Protean 
in  meaning,  less  stable  in  the  mouths  of  men.  Educa- 
tion meant  one  thing  a  thousand  years  ago;  quite  an- 
other thing  five  hundred  years  afterward ;  and  at  pres- 
ent differs  as  much  or  more  from  the  theory  and 
practice  of  a  century  since  as  did  that  century  from  an 
324 


Current  Educational 

earlier  age.  And  although  it  seems  hard  to  believe,  it 
is  highly  probable  that  a  period  later  than  our  own 
will  look  back  patronizingly  upon  this  day  as  dark 
enough  in  the  essentials  of  consciously  directed  human 
evolution.  For  education  is  a  growth,  changing  as 
man  himself  learns,  O  how  slowly  and  tortuously, 
about  his  needs  and  capacities  in  relation  to  this  world 
which  is  his  environment. 

It  is  rather  unfortunate  that  education  has  come  to 
be  confined  as  an  idea  to  certain  very  prescribed  and 
definite  activities  connected  with  school,  college,  and 
university.  It  gives  a  sort  of  exclusive  and  almost 
aristocratic  implication  to  the  term;  it  suggests  that 
some  (the  minority)  get  educated,  in  distinction  to 
the  vast  horde  who  do  not  go  through  the  mysterious 
process.  It  makes  the  self-educated  person  —  an 
absurd  phrase  for  an  absurd  notion,  since  if  you  your- 
self do  not  do  it,  nobody  else  will  —  adopt  a  depreca- 
tory attitude  before  the  more  fortunate  individual  who 
has  the  educational  cachet.  I  have  seen  human  be- 
ings who  never  went  to  college  so  richly,  broadly  cul- 
tured that  they  made  the  average  college  graduate  seem 
like  a  Bushman,  yet  at  an  apparent  disadvantage  be- 
cause no  sheepskin  hung  on  their  walls. 

Properly  defined,  of  course,  education  is  no  such 
cramped  and  limited  thing  as  this.  It  is  a  word  broad 
enough  to  include  all  the  influences  and  agencies  which 
serve  to  develop  the  potential  powers  of  a  human  being 
in  such  symmetry  as  to  make  him  of  maximum  value 
325 


OLittle  Essays  in  Xtterature  aito  SLffe 

to  himself  and  to  his  fellow-men.  In  this  sense,  edu- 
cation begins  in  the  cradle  and  is  not  over  at  the  grave. 

The  particular  contribution  of  our  own  time  to  this 
ever-changing  conception  seems  to  be  a  broadening  of 
the  older  academic  standard  in  the  direction  of  so-called 
practical  and  utilitarian  uses.  Manual  education,  the 
industrial,  technological,  agricultural,  and  economic, 
are  all  getting  full  recognition;  education  that  is  vo- 
cational, occupational,  wage-earning,  has  a  hearing  as 
never  before.  Popular  sympathy  is  plainly  with  the 
training  that  looks  to  early  financial  results,  that  is  as 
far  away  as  may  be  from  the  old-time  consecration  to 
the  classics.  At  the  commencement  exercises  of  a  large 
state  institution  this  month,  the  heartiest  applause  of 
the  day  was  for  the  group  of  young  women  who  stood 
on  the  stage  to  receive  their  degree  as  bachelors  of 
domestic  science.  There  is  a  general  and  growing  feel- 
ing that  education,  once  a  matter  of  exclusive  privilege 
and  class  distinction,  has  become  so  practical  and 
democratic  that  any  sort  of  training  which  fits  a  hu- 
man being  for  any  sort  of  definite  work,  and  so  makes 
him  a  better,  more  useful  member  of  society,  is  good 
and  must  be  given  to  the  student. 

The  underlying  principle  of  the  elective  system  of 
studies,  introduced  a  generation  ago  with  Harvard  as 
special  sponsor,  is  a  recognition  of  a  phase  of  the 
same  thing:  namely,  that  the  student  has  special  apti- 
tudes, and  that  those  aptitudes  should  be  discovered 
and  favored  by  the  educational  authorities,  instead  of 

326 


Current  Efcucatfonal  Hfceals 

trying  to  fit  all  students  alike  upon  the  Procrustean 
bed  of  mathematics,  literature  and  philosophy,  accord- 
ing to  the  sacred  trilogy  of  old.  Science,  during  the 
modern  period,  has  loomed  up  a  very  giant  in  its  de- 
mands upon  the  capacity  of  all  who  study,  and  in  its 
many  applied  uses  has  triumphantly  justified  its 
utilitarian  worth.  Philosophy  has  prospered  in  the 
popular  regard  only  when,  as  psychology,  it  flowers 
again  and  demonstrates  that  there  is  usefulness  in  a 
knowledge  which,  in  a  police  court,  can  say  a  wise 
word  concerning  the  blood  pressure  of  a  criminal  or 
discover  the  trouble  with  a  defective  child  in  the  ju- 
venile criminal  class.  Mathematics  is  still  tolerated, 
since  without  it  science  in  general  could  not  exist. 
But  poor  literature,  claiming  to  be  an  end  in  itself,  to  be 
for  the  high  pleasure  and  eternal  profit  of  man,  and 
nothing  else,  has  been  put  rather  on  'the  self-defensive 
in  these  latter  days.  How  does  a  knowledge  of  poetry 
help  wages  or  advance  a  man  in  business?  has  been  a 
frequent  cry.  Therefore,  down  with  letters! 

That  there  is  much  of  good  in  all  this  it  were  idle 
to  deny.  The  thought  that  education  is  not  for  the 
few  but  for  the  many;  that  a  Chautauqua  scheme  of 
study  can  do  much  to  supply  the  gap  left  by  missing 
the  regular  collegiate  drill;  and  that  training  for  life 
cannot  be  arbitrarily  limited,  as  in  the  past,  to  a  few 
traditional  studies,  given  undue  emphasis  because  of  the 
conservative  instinct  in  human  nature  and  the  undis- 
covered realms  of  knowledge,  is  all  so  admirable  and 
327 


Xittle  JB8B&V8  in  ^Literature  a^  Xite 

beneficial  to  the  world  at  large  that  it  is  an  ideal  worth 
fighting  for  and  justifies  the  dust  of  conflict  which  has 
in  our  day  at  times  confused  the  issues  and  made  educa- 
tion look  at  certain  moments  like  a  travesty  of  the  real 
thing. 

And  yet  one  may  see  something  of  danger  in  this 
hopeful  modern  situation.  The  tendency  to  regard  the 
practical,  wage-securing  training  and  the  cultural  train- 
ing as  one,  not  two,  is  and  always  will  be  wrong. 
Vocational  education  aims  to  prepare  the  individual  for 
a  specific  lifework ;  culture  prepares  him  for  life  in  the 
broader  sense,  so  as  to  put  him  on  a  higher  plane  of 
living,  and  to  get  most  out  of  life  in  the  way  of 
broad,  genial,  fruitful  contact.  The  professional  train- 
ing takes  care  of  a  man  downtown  during  his  office 
hours;  the  cultural  studies  take  care  of  and  make 
profitable  his  hours  with  his  family,  at  home  and  in 
society.  Both  are  legitimate,  both  valuable,  but  they 
must  be  kept  apart  in  any  wise  scheme  of  education. 
The  frequent  tendency  to  regard  them  as  one  in  the 
curriculum,  or  to  ignore  either  for  the  sake  of  the 
other,  can  only  be  productive  of  evil  results,  and  ed- 
ucators to-day  should  safeguard  both  and  with  lynx- 
eyed  watchfulness  conserve  the  dual  interests. 


328 


Ebougbt  anfc  IFta  Expression 

KNOW  what  you  have  to  say,"  announces  the 
trainer  of  youth,  "  and  then  say  it.  A  clear 
thought  will  give  clear  expression." 

It  would  all  be  very  simple  and  nice,  if  this  were 
only  so.  But  it  overlooks  the  sad  fact  that  to  have  a 
thought  involves  language;  that  you  cannot  have  a 
thought  unless  it  come  to  you  in  words;  and  that  there 
is  such  a  curiously  chemical  relation  between  thinking 
and  saying,  thought  and  expression,  that  to  separate 
the  two  is  a  scholastic  exercise  rather  than  a  human 
possibility. 

Here  is  one  of  the  many  pitfalls  of  style, —  your 
manner  of  expression  which,  perchance,  gives  what 
you  call  your  thought  distinction,  personality.  The 
way  you  put  it  has  a  remarkable  habit  of  running  away 
with  what  you  wish  to  put,  until  it  really  seems  as  if 
the  manner  settled  the  matter.  Indeed,  it  is  no  exag- 
geration to  declare  that  not  even  a  Kant  or  a  Spencer, 
in  stating  his  particular  philosophic  views,  expresses 
his  intellectual  attitude  quite  independent  of  the  lan- 
guage in  which  it  is  couched.  Nobody  —  mathema- 
tician, philosopher,  scientist  —  can  reach  a  point  where, 
superbly  aloof  from  words,  he  can  present  his  concep- 
329 


Xtttle  Essays  tn  ^literature  anfc  Xife 

tions  to  the  world.  The  very  word  "  concept  "  hints 
of  the  influence  of  language.  This  is  true  in  especial, 
when  the  manner  of  speech  takes  on  those  imaginative 
and  emotional  qualities  which  give  it  value  as  litera- 
ture. Language,  which  is  intended  to  reveal  thought, 
may  also  decorate  it,  fortify  it,  change  it  and  some- 
times hide  it  for  the  purposes  of  fun  or  satire  or  cun- 
ning virtuosity  of  display.  Language,  which  is  sup- 
posed to  state,  suggests  instead ;  in  place  of  proving,  it 
hints,  and  by  the  use  of  many  a  deft  innuendo  and  in- 
direction, wins  its  sinuous  way  into  our  feelings. 
Strictly,  we  might  say,  when  words  begin  persuasion 
takes  the  place  of  proof,  and  pleasure  interferes  with 
the  exactitude  of  pure  brain  functioning. 

Take  an  illustration.  George  Meredith,  in  "  Diana 
of  the  Crossways,"  speaks  of  "  thoughts  that  are  bare, 
dark  outlines,  colored  by  some  old  passion  of  the  soul, 
like  towers  of  a  distant  city  seen  in  the  funeral  waste 
of  day."  This  fine  sentence  certainly  means  something 
for  the  mind,  but  it  does  not  stop  there.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  means  far  more  to  the  imagination  and  emo- 
tion, and  it  is  fair  to  it  to  say  that  its  thought  value 
is  secondary  to  such  effects.  And  so  is  it  ever  with  the 
masters  of  speech.  They  stand  where  they  do  be- 
cause of  their  power  to  give  these  overtones  of  senti- 
ment to  the  activities  of  thought. 

Probably  the  better  advice  to  the  would-be  writer, 
therefore,  is  to  tell  him  to  dive  down  into  his  conscious- 
ness and  find  an  interest  and  a  conviction,  and  then  to 
330 


Ubougbt  an&  Uts  Expression 

begin  to  get  them  into  expression.  There  will  be,  and 
should  be,  blood  in  it  and  bias,  which  make  for  per- 
sonality. If  only  the  writer's  interest  be  strong  and 
sincere  enough,  what  he  says  will  rise  to  the  emotional 
plane  and  be  of  all  the  more  worth  for  that  reason. 
His  thought  as  such  may  be  of  little  or  no  value,  be- 
cause of  youth  and  inexperience;  but  an  honest  spurt 
of  feeling,  a  belief  that  has  back  of  it  the  rush  of  con- 
viction or  the  arterial  tide  of  passion,  is  sure  to  create 
for  itself  a  fitting  garment  of  words.  "  Have  some- 
thing to  say,"  might  better  be  written,  "  Believe  some- 
thing, feel  something,  and  then  say  it." 

Thus  may  we  modify  the  time-honored  instruction 
to  think  clearly,  whereupon  the  clear  expression  will 
take  care  of  itself.  A  fallacy  lurks  in  it,  and,  all  the 
rhetorics  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding,  it  will  not 
go  far  to  help  the  student  toward  the  truth.  This  is  not 
to  argue  against  lucidity  and  simplicity;  far  from  it. 
It  is  only  to  confess  frankly  that  words  shape  thought 
quite  as  truly  as  thought  shapes  language.  If  it  were 
the  fact  that  a  thought  could  arise  in  the  human  mind, 
and  the  thinker  go  out  and  acquire  the  suitable  cloth- 
ing for  it  by  selection  and  adaptation,  this  idea  might 
be  accepted.  Language  would  then  be  strictly  a  gar- 
ment for  thought  and  the  two  could  be  studied  apart. 
But  if  you  will  take  the  trouble  to  watch  a  single 
thought  from  the  moment  it  comes  into  your  self-con- 
sciousness until  the  expression  of  it,  spoken  or  written, 
you  will  discover  that  it  is  associated  with  words,  not 
331 


Xfttle  J6ssa£8  In  ^Literature  ant>  Xite 


in  the  sense  of  addition  and  adornment  but  in  a  far 
more  vital  way:  words  being  blood  of  its  blood  and 
bone  of  its  bone.  Philologists  divide  into  schools  over 
the  question  whether,  in  human  evolution,  thought 
precedes  words,  or  the  reverse.  But  practically,  you 
never  will  catch  them  apart;  their  connection  is  that 
of  the  Siamese  Twins. 

It  is  well  to  appreciate  this,  because  it  sets  us  right 
toward  style  and  saves  us  from  the  cheap  and  shallow 
notion  that  it  is  a  thing  less  important  than  thought 
and  to  be  artificially  separated  from  it:  a  kind  of  de- 
vice, to  be  tolerated  and  at  times  even  applauded,  but 
at  the  best  a  sort  of  poor  relation  to  the  noble  thinking 
process.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  that  process  could  not 
exist  at  all  without  the  self-expression  which  gives  it 
point,  understanding,  attraction,  yes,  being.  "  In  the 
beginning  was  the  Word." 

That  idea  of  style  —  which  is  really  the  personal  way 
of  saying  a  thing  so  that  it  may  be  understood  and 
give  pleasure  —  as  if  it  were  a  detached  trick,  some- 
thing that  can  be  added  after  the  thought  has  been 
evolved,  is  still  taught  in  the  schools,  more  or  less, 
to  the  injury  of  all  concerned.  It  justifies  the 
Philistine  scorn  of  it  as  a  parlor  accomplishment,  a 
superficial  prettification,  the  business  of  idlers  and  de- 
generate esthetes.  If  your  average  citizen  could  grasp 
the  truth  that  he,  too,  has  a  style  in  verbal  expression, 
and  that  it  is,  as  a  rule,  pretty  bad,  a  fellow-feeling 
might  give  him  more  breadth  of  mind  on  this  matter. 
332 


an&  Ht5  Expression 

Finding  himself  cursed  with  style,  anyway,  he  might 
seek  to  improve  it.  Think  he  must,  in  his  business, 
his  profession;  and  as  he  may  not  think  without  ex- 
pression, words,  and  a  manner  of  words,  it  behooves 
him  to  mend  his  ways. 

But  it  is  upon  the  unfortunate  school  children  that 
the  wrong  view  falls  heaviest.  Poor  dears,  they  have 
a  hard  time  of  it  at  the  best,  and  to  teach  them  that 
their  crude,  inchoate  chunks  of  thought  must  be 
dragged  forth  by  a  kind  of  Caesarian  operation  and 
then,  while  yet  unaccustomed  to  the  pitiless  light  of 
day,  be  gaily  decked  out  with  "  words,  words,  words," 
is  to  add  a  quite  unnecessary  extra  burden  to  their 
sufficient  scholastic  woes.  No,  teach  them  to  live, 
quicken  their  interest,  widen  their  horizon  of  knowl- 
edge, let  them  react  ever  more  freely  to  life's  stimuli, 
and  you  will  find  that  —  just  because  they  are  in- 
creasingly alive  —  they  will  develop  ideas,  and  those 
ideas  will  inevitably  take  the  form  of  words  in  a  syn- 
chronous process.  If  one  has  not  reacted  to  life  at  all, 
neither  thought  nor  words  will  come.  The  condition 
of  worthy  thought  linked  to  worthy  expression  is  to 
have  lived.  Teach  the  pupil  that  the  word  is  an  or- 
ganic exponent  of  the  thought,  and  that  both  thought 
and  word  are  one  in  the  deepest  sense,  and  he  will  rise 
up  and  call  you  blessed, —  and  incidentally  become  a 
better  writer,  or  human  being  expressing  his  thought 
through  the  inevitable  mode  of  language. 


333 


ffacetiae 


Concerning  tbe  3acha$$ 

COLERIDGE  did  a  unique  thing  in  writing  a 
serious  lyric  on  a  young  ass  tethered  near  its 
mother  by  the  roadside.  It  was  a  daring  literary 
venture,  since  the  very  connotation  of  the  word  im- 
plies comedy  or  contempt.  But  Coleridge  felt  other- 
wise; his  feeling  was  that  of  pity  and  affection: 

Poor  little  foal  of  an  oppressed  race, 
I  love  the  languid  patience  of  thy  face, 

—  he  began,  and  later  apostrophized  him  thus: 

Innocent  foal,  thou  poor  despised  forlorn, 
I  hail  thee  brother, —  spite  of  the  fool's  scorn. 

Here  the  poet  seems  either  to  harbor  the  thought 
that  the  donkey  is  not  the  ass  he  is  taken  to  be,  or  else 
that  man  is  his  fellow-ass  without  knowing  it.  It  may 
be  both  thoughts  were  in  his  mind. 

For,  in  truth,  is  this  particular  variant  of  the  brute 
kind  so  deserving  of  the  stigma  of  the  ages  as  our  lan- 
guage would  imply?  The  mule,  with  neither  pride  of 
pedigree  nor  hope  of  posterity,  is  indeed  in  piteous  case, 
and  may  properly  stand  as  a  synonym  of  stupidity. 
But  to  impute  to  the  gentle,  long-eared  ass  a  similar 
attribute  would  seem  to  be  laying  the  last  straw  upon 
an  already  overburdened  back. 
337 


Xittie  Essays  in  literature  an&  %ite 

For  some  of  the  ass's  characteristics  are  anything  but 
asinine  in  the  vulgar  sense.  We  accuse  him  of  slow- 
ness: yet  what  quadruped  tamed  by  man  is  swifter 
than  the  hardy  little  Neapolitan  donkey,  which  darts 
from  street  to  street  as  the  swallow  from  cliff  to  cliff? 
Slow  to  anger  he  is,  of  a  verity,  for  the  cabbies  in  the 
city  by  the  wondrous  bay  are  cruelty  personified;  and 
of  all  things  surely  not  slow-footed. 

And  again,  if  our  donkey's  head  be  foolish,  yet  are 
his  feet  both  slow  and  sure  when  those  qualities  are 
needed;  I  mean  when  you  bestride  your  burro  and 
climb  eight  or  ten  thousand  feet  up  a  California  moun- 
tain, with  one  leg  most  of  the  time  dangling  over  a 
canyon  fifteen  hundred  feet  below;  how  wonderful 
then  is  this  beast,  and  how  one  relies  upon  him  in  the 
hour  of  peril!  It  may  be  added  that  the  slowness  of 
the  ass  refers  to  the  domestic  variety,  for  the  wild  ass 
of  the  Orient  (like  him  of  the  human  family)  is  noted 
for  being  swift. 

But,  it  is  said,  the  ass  is  obstinate.  There  be  times 
when,  planting  his  forefeet  squarely  in  front  of  him, 
and  with  a  bray  of  triumphant  rage,  he  becomes 
granite-like  in  immobility,  recalling  Scott's  line: 

This  rock  shall  fly 
From  its  firm  base   as   soon   as  I. 

The  question  here  is,  What  do  you  mean  by 
obstinate?  The  men  who  held  the  pass  at 
Thermopylae  were  obstinate,  in  the  sense  that  they 

338 


Concerning  tbe  -Jackass 

held  their  ground,  and  history  has  justified,  nay,  ap- 
plauded them  to  the  echo.  Did  they  have  a  sufficient 
reason  for  blocking  the  way?  That  is  the  only  proper 
query.  So  with  our  friend  the  ass.  Is  he  stupid, 
stopping  without  rhyme  or  reason;  or,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  his  driver  an  ass,  whose  attitude  is  an  epitome 
of  unreasonableness?  The  trouble  between  the  two 
has  never  been  rightly  adjudicated;  we  have  never 
heard  from  the  donkey.  With  dignified  reserve  he  re- 
frains from  speech  (he  does  not  even  vent  one  bray 
under  the  excusable  circumstances),  and  simply  sticks, 
all  belaborings  and  profane  objurgations  to  the  con- 
trary. 

I  would  give  a  shiny  silver  coin  to  look  into  his  face 
and  know  just  why.  My  misgivings  as  to  his  mo- 
tives are  as  naught  compared  with  what  I  feel  con- 
cerning his  two-footed  boss  who  tries  to  compel  him 
with  a  club.  About  his  idiocy  I  am  sure,  whereas  Mr. 
Donkey's  is  only  a  matter  of  tradition.  Suppose  the 
driver,  in  the  spirit  of  Coleridge,  had  whispered  kind- 
nesses, fed  him  sugar,  or  chanted  a  couplet  of  good 
fellowship;  will  anybody  in  his  senses  dare  say  the 
issue  might  not  have  been  happy  ? 

Stevenson's  Modestine  (a  darling  creature)  needed, 
I  grant  you,  the  unhallowed  staff;  but  then  Modestine 
was  an  arrant  little  coquette,  with  all  the  airs,  graces 
and  innuendoes  of  her  type.  It  were  as  unfair  to 
judge  ass-kind  by  a  Modestine  as  to  judge  woman- 
kind by  a  Helen  of  Troy.  Moreover,  let  it  be  remem- 
339 


Xittle  JEssass  in  ^Literature  ant)  Xife 


bered  that  in  the  end  she  showed  the  deeper  qualities 
of  her  sex:  eating  cleanly  out  of  her  master's  hand,  a 
perfect  lady  in  her  daintiness,  and  so  loving  him  that 
when  he  had  to  sell  her  he  shed  unashamed  tears. 
Mayhap  it  is  the  hybrid  mule  who  is  mulishly  set  in 
his  own  opinion,  rather  than  the  patient,  long-suffer- 
ing ass,  whose  name  is  so  unjustly  a  laughing-stock 
among  men. 

A  jackass  is  defined  by  the  dictionary  as  "  male  ass, 
—  hence,  a  stupid  or  ignorant  person."  Really,  one 
objects  to  that  "  hence."  It  involves  a  most  illegiti- 
mate inference.  The  ass  has  been  maltreated  in  his- 
tory and  fact,  and  even  the  mule  maligned.  To  be 
sure-footed  and  steady-headed,  patient  and  silent,  de- 
nied by  fate  a  sweet  voice,  yet  so  generous  as  seldom 
to  punish  us  with  the  raucous  cry  of  which  he  is 
capable;  docile  as  a  pet,  yet  valiant  on  the  road;  to 
serve,  to  suffer  and  to  be  silent,  that  is  the  Saga  of 
the  ass,  and  one  he  need  not  be  ashamed  of.  He  has 
been  the  friend  of  man,  humble,  faithful,  and  unap- 
preciated, for  unreckoned  generations  in  the  Occident. 
In  the  Orient,  in  ancient  days,  it  is  pleasant  to  recall, 
in  view  of  his  virtues,  that  he  flaunted  it  like  any 
aristocrat;  to  ride  into  the  city  upon  his  back  was  to 
enter  like  a  prince.  If  the  donkey  ever  indulges  in 
retrospect,  how  sadly  must  he  hark  back  to  early  days 
in  his  original  eastern  habitat,  gaily  caparisoned,  high 
fed,  sleek  and  favored.  To  pass  from  this  to  a  life 
of  straitened  toil  and  subjugation  is  indeed  a  come- 
340 


Concerning  tbe  Jacfeass 

down  suggesting  the  irony  of  fate  for  biped  or 
quadruped. 

If  the  ass  now  seem  meek,  homely,  and  subsidiary 
to  the  horse,  we  should  try  to  detach  ourselves  from 
tradition  and  to  detect  in  his  look  of  meek  amiability 
a  sort  of  suppressed  wisdom, —  undeniable  traces  of  a 
great  past.  Looks  against  looks,  he  is  quite  the  equal 
of  the  horse  to-day,  with  more  of  intelligence  and 
spirituality  (if  not  spirit)  in  his  physiognomy. 

Literature  should  take  account  of  all  this  misun- 
derstanding of  equus  asinus,  an  animal  both  useful  and 
ornamental  in  his  best  estate,  of  high  moral  qualities, 
and  a  pleasant  companion  withal;  it  should  in  poem, 
essay  and  fiction  so  draw  this  four-footed  bearer  of 
burdens  that  he  shall  take  his  rightful  place  in  the  ani- 
mal kingdom.  Coleridge  gave  a  hint  of  what  might 
be  done, —  let  others  follow  example.  As  the  human 
race  evolves,  justice  will  be  done  the  donkey.  Al- 
ready, such  is  our  friendly  and  affectionate  feeling  for 
the  dog  as  a  type  that  the  word  is  not  so  bitter  in  the 
mouth  as  it  was  when  Shylock  hurled  it.  The  ass  in 
time  will  no  longer  connote  the  fool;  and  the  human 
jackass,  member  of  an  association  perhaps  the  largest  in 
the  world,  will  perforce  take  another  name. 


341 


Gbe  Essence  of  ibumor 

'TTE  is  a  fine  man  and  she  is  very  nice,  but  they 
•••  -*•  have  no  sense  of  humor," —  how  often  you 
hear  the  remark.  Whenever  I  do,  I  secretly  wonder 
just  what  is  meant,  and  how  humor  is  to  be  defined. 
Because,  not  seldom,  on  meeting  the  persons  referred 
to,  I  find  them  quite  capable  of  smiling  on  occasion, 
and  apparently  responsive  to  a  joke.  It  becomes  evi- 
dent that  "  one  man's  meat  is  another  man's  poisson" 
as  Oliver  Herford  has  it,  in  this  matter  of  fun. 

What,  indeed,  is  the  essence  of  humor?  The  sub- 
ject may  be  light,  but  the  question  is  a  serious  one,  be- 
cause very  difficult.  Perhaps  we  shall  come  at  it,  al- 
though with  no  pretense  of  a  complete  answer,  if  we 
say  that  to  have  that  precious  thing,  a  sense  of  humor, 
is  to  possess  a  perception  of  the  harmless  incongruity 
that  is  in  life.  And  this  perception  must  center  in  man, 
for  detached  from  him  it  does  not  exist;  there  is  no 
humor  in  a  landscape,  for  example,  unless  in  some  way 
man  is  injected  into  it. 

The  incongruity  must  be  harmless  and  salutary,  note, 
because  a  great  deal  of  life's  incongruity  is  tragic:  as 
where  a  demented  person  breaks  into  laughter  at  a 
342 


Ube  JBssence  ot  Dumot 

funeral,  or  a  corpse  is  jolted  into  an  absurd  posture. 
The  juxtaposition  of  unlike  things,  which  might  be 
regarded  as  a  paraphrase  for  incongruity,  is  of  many 
kinds:  external  and  internal,  physical  or  mental;  but 
always  the  principle  of  the  unexpected  setting  together 
of  things  not  commonly  associated  will  be  found  be- 
neath. To  see  a  short  man  linked  by  marriage  with  a 
tall  grenadier  of  a  woman  is  funny,  as  an  external 
spectacle,  simply  for  the  reason  that  the  convention 
is  the  other  way:  we  expect  the  husband  to  be  the 
taller.  In  Mars  it  may  well  be  that  the  association  of 
ideas  is  the  reverse ;  and  we  should  shriek  with  merri- 
ment to  see  a  tall  man  and  his  short  wife  go  by.  If 
a  decorous  and  solemn  citizen  of  the  town  is  precipitated 
on  a  snowy  morning  on  the  sidewalk,  and  his  silk  hat 
goes  careening  into  the  gutter,  we  are  likely  to  snicker 
in  spite  of  ourselves.  Why?  Because  such  gyra- 
tions are  the  furthest  possible  removed  from  the  gen- 
tleman's usual  manner  of  locomotion.  Then,  too,  hu- 
manity at  large  does  not  plan  to  have  such  accidents 
happen,  so  that  there  is  a  double  incongruity  in  the 
scene. 

When  a  man  who  is  the  best  representative  of  hypoc- 
risy in  the  city  harangues  his  fellow-citizens  from  a 
public  platform,  in  all  seriousness,  against  the  very  sin 
of  which  he  is  the  living  embodiment,  we  get  an 
illustration  of  that  subtler,  inward  incongruity  which 
rises  into  the  region  of  satiric  comedy;  the  kind  of 
picture  an  Aristophanes  or  an  Ibsen  would  delight  to 
343 


Xittle  JEssass  tn  ^Literature  a^  %tfe 


paint  for  us.  And  so  on  with  other  incongruities  not 
a  few,  objective  or  subjective. 

When  the  fun  is  full  of  kindness  and  heart,  it  gives 
us  humor  in  contrast  with  that  other  sort  of  fun  which 
we  call  wit;  for  wit  is  the  humor  of  the  intellect.  If 
our  individual  brain,  for  instance,  supplies  at  once  the 
omitted  links  in  a  story,  so  that  we  see  the  point  as  soon 
as  do  others,  or,  better  yet,  a  little  before  them,  we 
laugh  not  only  at  the  relationship  hitherto  unsuspected 
between  two  things,  but  also  because  our  intellect  was 
so  very  bright  as  to  make  the  connection  without 
difficulty.  The  subtler  the  connection  the  more  we 
felicitate  ourselves.  Thus  there  is  an  element  of  in- 
tellectual pride  in  this  sort  of  comic  appeal,  which 
commonly  uses  indirection  as  its  method;  a  method  in 
which  American  humor,  by  the  way,  is  especially  skil- 
ful and  the  subtlety  of  which  is  supposed  to  bother  our 
oversea  cousins,  the  British. 

Humor,  to  the  philosophic  mind,  is  the  relief  from 
the  tragic  nature  of  life  which  humanity  in  self-defense 
seizes  on  from  time  to  time.  We  speak  of  "  comic  re- 
lief "  in  drama  in  another  sense;  but  relief  it  is  in  a 
deeper  significance.  That  a  nation  is  humorous,  there- 
fore, seeming  to  have  a  genius  for  fun,  does  not  imply 
light-mindedness  but,  on  the  contrary,  depth  of  na- 
ture. Humor  is  one  of  the  cardinal  characteristics  of 
our  native  letters;  and  to^  me  it  indicates  the  seri- 
ous, strenuous  (I  insist  on  not  giving  up  a  good  word 
simply  because  it  has  been  overworked)  nature  of  the 
344 


TEbe  Essence  of  Dumor 

American  life  and  disposition;  pushed  on  by  climate, 
burning  the  candle  at  both  ends  in  the  fierce  com- 
petitive struggle, —  if  we  did  not  laugh,  we  should 
die.  The  animals  do  not  laugh;  they  have  no  sense 
of  humor.  Why  so?  Surely,  for  the  reason  that 
they  have  no  self-conscious  perception  of  this  doomful 
world. 

What  is  true  of  the  nation  is  true  of  the  individual ; 
a  great  humorist  —  not  a  mere  mountebank  whose 
verbal  somersaults  in  the  paper  amuse  us  for  the  mo- 
ment —  is  always  one  who  has  a  big,  sympathetic,  sensi- 
tive soul,  terribly  aware  of  the  tragic  possibilities  of 
the  ticklish  business  of  living.  Aristophanes,  Rabelais, 
Moliere,  Heine,  Mark  Twain, —  they  are  brothers 
under  the  skin  in  this  respect.  And  their  highest  func- 
tion is  found  in  the  way  in  which  they  make  us  smile 
the  sympathetic  smile  of  tolerance,  pity,  and  fellow- 
feeling,  thereby  uniting  mankind  in  the  fraternity  of 
the  heart.  Great  as  is  humor's  mission  in  the  satiric 
laughter  which  drives  out  sham  and  folly  and  pretense, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  humor  of  a  Dickens  at 
his  best  has  the  precious  touch  which  makes  the  whole 
world  kin,  and  becomes  both  an  enheartening  influence 
and  a  reformatory  force.  Not  satire,  but  love,  is  its 
dominating  spirit. 

We  may  be  sure  that  whenever  the  so-called  humor- 
ist fails  to  meet  this  test  of  an  underlying  seriousness 
of  intention,  a  failure  to  recognize  the  sort  of  world 
we  live  in,  his  permanence  may  be  doubted;  nay,  we 
345 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  arto  %ife 

may  refuse  him  the  title,  "  humorist,"  in  the  finer 
meaning  of  the  word.  He  is  a  "  funny  man,"  and  that 
is  all. 

The  deadly  thing  about  fun  that  is  forced  is  that  it 
is  the  result  of  brain-fagged  pressure,  instead  of  bub- 
bling spontaneously  up  from  the  heart ;  and  this  applies 
to  punning  as  well  as  to  the  other  forms  of  humor 
which  seem  less  intellectual.  A  truly  splendid  pun, 
like  one  of  Lamb's,  Sidney  Smith's  or  Oscar  Wilde's, 
is  an  electric  flash ;  and  the  ignition  occurs  at  the  mo- 
ment when  the  brain  seizes  with  lightning-like  rapidity 
upon  a  thought  emanating  from  the  heart.  In  the 
case  of  the  poor  pun,  however, —  is  there  anything 
sadder  this  side  of  Charon's  boat  ?  The  heartf ul  spon- 
taneity lacks,  and  the  miserable,  jaded  brain  is  asked 
to  do  its  work  all  alone. 

Blessed  be  humor,  through  whose  kindly  power  we 
shame  man  out  of  his  many  foolishnesses,  and  set  him 
in  sympathetic  contact  with  his  kind,  while  easing  his 
soul  from  the  strain  of  life. 


346 


H  Suppresses  flnstinct 

MAN  to-day  has  become  the  undecorated  animal, 
while  woman  flaunts  the  gay  plumage.  Man 
used  to  wear  it,  and  now  he  only  pays  for  it, —  if  he 
can.  If  we  had  no  recourse  to  history,  it  might 
appear  that  this  was  in  the  nature  of  things,  but  we 
know  better.  Go  back  only  so  far  as  the  eighteenth 
century,  and  we  see  the  male  gladly  making  himself 
beautiful  with  ruffles  and  small-clothes,  many-colored 
waistcoats  and  full-bottomed  wigs.  His  personal 
vanity,  now  for  several  generations  pretty  well  con- 
cealed and  suppressed,  was  given  the  chance  in  the 
elder  days  to  flower  out  in  his  garb  and  he  walked  forth 
appareled  like  the  sun. 

In  the  Elizabethan  time,  the  dress  of  a  courtier  was 
such  that  the  head  spins  to  read  of  it;  there  was 
as  much  difference  between  a  gallant  then  and  now  as 
between  a  peony  and  a  fountain  pen.  Even  in  the 
early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  we  are  told  how 
the  young  Disraeli  wore  lace  ruffles  at  the  end  of  his 
coat  sleeves,  so  long  that  he  had  to  turn  them  back 
to  grasp  his  fork  at  table.  Bulwer  Lytton  was  another 
exquisite  whose  garments  were  resplendent ;  and  Dick- 
ens as  a  youth  rivaled  any  buck  going  in  the  variegated 
347 


Xittle  Essays  tn  ^Literature  arto  Xife 

splendor  of  his  vesture,  and  clung  to  a  flamboyant  at- 
tire into  later  life,  so  that  when  he  came  to  America 
for  his  second  reading  tour  in  1867,  he  still  dressed 
in  a  manner  to  awaken  the  ire  or  amusement  of  the 
sober,  black-garbed  Puritans  of  this  land.  There  are 
folk  yet  living  to  tell  us  of  his  chains  and  rings,  his 
wondrous  waistcoats  and  spectacular  scarves.  It  was 
all  an  innocent  retention  of  the  days  of  the  Regency, 
a  clinging  in  late  manhood  to  the  habits  of  a  quarter 
of  a  century  before.  It  must  have  been  piquant  indeed 
to  live  in  those  days  of  exuberant  apparel  and  frank 
devotion  to  bodily  adornment. 

Then,  later,  came  a  time  of  penance,  if  not  of  prayer. 
The  colorful  picturesqueness  gave  way  to  a  sad  uni- 
formity of  black.  Man  went  among  his  fellows  re- 
duced to  a  dark  monotony  of  clothes,  and  the  cut 
thereof  left  no  room  for  the  decorative  ideal.  Instead 
of  the  jaunty  bonnet  of  yore,  with  its  debonair  feather, 
he  donned  the  unspeakable  ugliness  of  the  derby; 
where  once  were  knee-breeches  and  handsome  silk 
stockings,  shapeless  pantaloons  hid  the  contour  of  his 
nether  extremities,  and  the  legitimate  pride  in  seemly 
calves  was  no  more.  Frilled  shirt  fronts  were  re- 
placed by  the  uncompromising,  icy  glare  of  the  modern 
substitute,  and  at  evening  assemblies  he  who  was  once 
the  cynosure  of  all  eyes  was  now  hopelessly  confused 
with  mere  waiters  and  butlers.  All  was  a  dead  level 
of  negative  commonplace  and  drab,  grave-like  nonen- 
tity. 

348 


a  Suppresses  Unstinct 

Can  it  be  that  this  transformation  has  not  had  its 
accompanying  effect  upon  character?  Does  not  man 
suffer  from  this  suppressed  instinct  of  decoration,  so 
natural,  so  deep-seated, —  as  we  are  aware  whenever 
we  observe  the  holiday  aspect  of  the  male  bird,  in  com- 
parison with  the  modestly  dressed  feminine  mate  whom 
he  courts;  or,  from  a  safe  distance,  admire  the  noble 
markings  of  the  male  lion  beside  his  maneless  mate? 
Here  is  grave  matter  for  the  modern  philosopher,  whose 
business  it  is  to  study  the  inward  effect  of  outer  habits 
and  customs.  Is  it  not  possible  to  touch  upon  one  of 
many  consequences  of  this  mournful  modern  rehabilita- 
tion of  a  creature  who  of  old  time  was  beautiful  to 
look  upon?  Is  it  not  more  than  likely  that  the  with- 
drawal of  man  from  the  field  of  competitive  ornament, 
leaving  woman  sole  possessor  therein,  has  led  her  into 
unnatural  efforts  of  extravagant  display?  A  shallow 
reasoner  might  here  reply  that,  competition  on  the  part 
of  man  being  removed,  woman  has  less  incentive  to 
decoration.  But  this  is  a  wretched  quibble.  For  the 
spirit  of  emulation  is  constantly  inflamed  by  fellow- 
woman;  and,  moreover,  when  man  was  still  decora- 
tively  active,  he  deflected  a  large  part  of  the  available 
money  from  the  feminine  wardrobe,  and  so  limited  the 
possibilities.  And,  let  it  be  remembered,  clothes  al- 
ways have  cost  cash  —  though  so  many  beaux  and  belles 
did  not  pay  their  bills  —  and,  after  all,  there  is  only  so 
much  money  to  spend.  Man's  retirement  as  a  dressy 
object  has  indeed  wrought  incalculable  harm;  it  has 
349 


Xittle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

made  the  world  less  agreeable  as  a  spectacle,  and  it  has 
tempted  his  partner  in  the  parade  to  excesses  of  display 
which  make  the  thoughtful  observer  shudder.  We 
should  have  harmony  of  dress,  both  sexes  participating 
in  a  general  result  of  charm  that  blends  to  make  an 
artistic  whole ;  in  place  of  which  what  we  really  see  is  a 
lopsided  emphasis  upon  only  one  aspect  of  the  infinite 
opportunities  for  personal  expression  in  one's  clothes. 
Half  the  human  race  has  thus  been  shut  out  from  the 
privilege  of  pleasing  the  taste  by  dress.  Could  unfair 
repression  or  unequal  rights  further  go? 

In  the  light  of  these  melancholy  reflections,  it  is  all 
the  pleasanter  to  observe  the  feeble  yet  obvious  move- 
ment toward  a  brighter  and  more  varied  attire  in  man. 
To  suppress  any  good  instinct  is  dangerous,  and  as  a 
rule  brings  its  inevitable  reaction.  The  suppressed  de- 
sire to  decorate  and  delight  the  eye,  so  long  sternly  re- 
buked by  fashion,  has  of  late  years  given  signs  of  re- 
bellion; man  has  dared,  albeit  timidly,  apologetically, 
to  don  a  color  here  and  there,  to  break  away  from  the 
horrid  uniformity  of  black,  and  to  remind  the  world 
that  he  was,  in  happier  days,  a  lover  of  decoration  in 
his  own  person.  His  waistcoats  have  become  many- 
hued,  if  still  prevailingly  sober.  He  has  worn  nattily, 
upon  a  head  for  painful  years  disfigured  by  the  derby 
or  the  silk  topper,  the  soft  fedora  or  the  rakish  cap. 
His  shirts,  white  and  stiff  of  yore,  have  broken  out  into 
a  very  revel  of  chromatic  insubordination,  and  are  made 
of  textures  that,  unstarched  and  silky,  have  ministered 
350 


H  Suppresses  f  nstinct 

to  his  comfort,  while  making  the  eye  glad.  His  ties, 
too,  have  run  the  gamut  of  hues,  his  shoes  changed  from 
black  to  tan,  his  handkerchiefs,  like  butterflies  in  the 
air,  flaunted  the  prismatic  tints.  He  has  bought  him 
suits  that  a  generation  since  would  have  been  looked  at 
askance,  if  they  had  not  actually  injured  his  social 
standing. 

In  short,  he  has  at  last  escaped  from  the  grim  prison 
of  restraint  where  for  a  pensive  period  he  has  lan- 
guished in  darkness  and  neglect,  and  now  again  taken 
his  rightful  place  before  society.  Not  that  he  is  yet 
the  rival  of  woman  in  the  decorative  battle;  no,  she  is 
still  supreme,  for  price  and  power.  But  he  is  no  longer 
an  entirely  negligible  factor;  that  is  the  point.  All 
the  indications  are  that  from  this  time  out  he  will 
more  and  more,  gaining  courage  as  he  ventures,  as- 
sume the  glory  that  was  Brummel  and  the  grandeur 
that  was  Nash.  Thus,  in  the  fullness  of  time,  shall 
a  proper  equilibrium  be  struck,  and  man  and  woman, 
in  the  great  future  that  we  so  confidently  expect  for 
the  two  sexes,  move  side  by  side,  each  beautiful  to  the 
other,  and  the  wardrobe  of  both  the  wonder  of  a  world. 
Evolution  does  most  plainly  promise  us  this  happy  day. 


351 


©f  Bareness  anO  %iQbt 

MARK  TWAIN  in  his  last  years,  as  all  the 
world  knows,  steadily  wore  his  famous  white 
suit,  and  it  was  referred  to  in  some  quarters  as  an 
example  of  silly,  old-age  vanity,  to  be  forgiven  only 
in  a  man  of  genius.  That  Mark  Twain  did  it,  ex- 
plained but  could  not  excuse  it  in  the  eyes  of  those 
who  were  too  blind  to  understand. 

This  was  a  most  shallow  reading  of  the  fact. 
There  was  much  more  in  it  than  appears  on  the 
surface.  Mark  Twain  was  that  rare  thing,  an  ab- 
solutely original  human  being,  who  dared  to  be  him- 
self, while  the  run  of  humanity  tamely  imitates, 
follows  and  irons  out  individuality.  The  master  hu- 
morist once  gave  his  own  reasons  for  the  alleged 
idiosyncrasy:  "When  a  man  reaches  the  advanced 
age  of  seventy-one  years,  the  continual  sight  of  dark 
clothing  is  likely  to  have  a  depressing  effect  upon  him. 
Light-colored  clothing  is  more  pleasing  to  the  eye  and 
enlivens  the  spirit.  Now,  of  course,  I  cannot  compel 
every  one  to  wear  such  clothing  just  for  my  especial 
benefit,  so  I  do  the  next  best  thing,  and  do  it  myself." 

Could  anything  be  saner,  truer,  more  penetrating  in 
its  implied  criticism  of  conventions?  Mankind  bows 
352 


®f  Bareness  an&  3Li0bt 

to  the  tyranny  of  the  dark  from  the  day  when  he  dreads 
to  go  to  bed  in  ft  to  that  when  he  associates  it 
with  the  last  sad  rites  or  uses  it  as  a  metaphor  of 
the  passing  away  from  this  present  life,  from  "  the 
glorious  sun-colored  earth."  And  in  nothing  is  this 
truer  than  in  its  application  to  clothes.  Carlyle  has 
dilated  long  since  on  the  shams  that  are  masked  un- 
der the  garbs  and  habits  of  this  world;  but  a  special 
chapter  should  be  written  upon  the  effect  of  our  ex- 
ternal habiliments,  according  to  the  color  which  they 
show. 

Reflect  on  our  customs  and  associations  in  this  mat- 
ter. With  the  masculine  half  of  the  universe  at  least, 
the  "  customary  suits  of  solemn  black  "  go  with  occa- 
sions that  are  formal,  serious,  grave  or  outright  sad. 
It  is  only  of  late  years  that  man  has  dared  more  or 
less  feebly  to  break  away  from  the  time-honored  and 
purely  conventional  notion  that  it  is  more  seemly  to 
adopt  funereal  dress  for  almost  every  function  of  life 
save  those  of  business  and  outdoor  pleasure.  Women 
have  exercised  more  freedom  than  men  in  this  respect: 
a  curious  reflection,  since  the  spindle  sex  is  supposed  to 
be  more  conservative,  less  subject  to  change  than  the 
spear  side  of  the  house.  Nowadays,  and  very  rapidly, 
we  have  come  to  realize  that  it  is  pleasant  and  not  un- 
righteous to  wear  colors  of  cheerfuller  aspect. 

But  how  we  sinned  in  the  past  in  this  respect !  How 
for  many  of  us  Sunday  was  a  lugubrious  day  because 
it  meant  clothing  not  only  stiff  and  uncomfortable, 
353 


Xtttie  Essays  in  ^literature  an&  Xffe 

but  also  clothing  gloomily  somber,  merging  with  the 
general  gloom  of  the  old  penitential  Sabbath.  The 
small  boy  brought  up  in  this  fashion  could  not  be 
blamed  if  he  imbibed  the  idea  that  Christians  were  a 
sort  of  people  who  preferred  darkness  to  light;  for 
whom  a  day  was  set  apart  in  which  the  black  clothes 
worn  were  a  symbol  of  the  sinful  state  within.  The 
association  of  black,  too,  with  death  and  all  that 
thereto  belongs  is  certainly  of  questionable  worth,  and 
not  a  few  signs  to-day  point  to  an  appreciation  of  the 
theory  that  we  have,  to  put  it  mildly,  overdone  the  cus- 
tom :  those  who  have  lost  dear  ones  do  not  now  always, 
for  such  protracted  periods  or  to  such  a  degree,  bury 
themselves  in  the  mournful  signs  of  woe.  The  proper 
respect  and  devotion  to  the  well-remembered  and 
loved  can  never  pass  away.  But  the  formal,  conven- 
tional outer  indications  thereof  may  be  mitigated  to 
the  advantage  of  all  concerned.  The  test  is  within,  not 
without,  as  the  great  words  of  Isaiah  imply :  "  I  shall 
go  softly  all  my  years  in  the  bitterness  of  my  soul." 

Winter  is  a  time  of  less  color  than  summer,  in  na- 
ture the  whites  and  duns  and  browns  predominate; 
and  all  unconsciously,  perhaps,  we  dress  accordingly, 
and  one  of  the  many  joys  of  the  returning  spring 
(this  applies  in -special  force  to  the  male  of  the  race) 
is  to  be  found  in  the  gayer  garments  donned  by  men, 
reflecting  in  their  very  persons  the  chromatics  of  Na- 
ture, the  freer,  fuller,  more  natural  outdoor  life 
heralded  by  the  change  of  seasons. 
354 


®f  Bavfcness 

Nor  should  it  be  forgotten  that  color  has  its 
psychology,  so  that  the  hue  of  garments  bears  a  close 
relation  to  the  mood  of  the  wearer  and  helps  to  create 
that  mood.  Recent  laboratory  investigations  are  mak- 
ing us  understand  as  never  before  that  when  the  cheer- 
ful yellow  of  sunlight  or  the  restful  green  of  trees, 
or  again  the  violent  reds  and  purples  of  some  decora- 
tion are  spoken  of,  the  language  is  not  mere  rhetoric 
and  metaphor,  but  the  statement  of  a  fact.  Other 
things  being  equal,  a  comedy  scene  on  the  stage  that 
is  set  in  yellow  will  play  best,  and  so  will  an  emo- 
tional scene  that  is  set  in  red.  The  human  instinct 
to  put  on  bright,  light,  joyous  clothes  is  far  more  than 
a  primitive  desire  for  personal  adornment;  it  is  an 
impulse  toward  happiness,  a  craving  for  life,  a  repug- 
nance from  all  that  means  deprivation,  darkness  and 
death.  It  is  all  part  of  the  human  aspiration  for 
light,  the  longing  which  called  forth  the  memorable 
death-bed  utterance  of  Goethe :  "  Mehr  Licht !  "  It 
gleams  out  in  that  passage  in  Revelation :  "  And 
round  about  the  throne  were  four  and  twenty  seats; 
and  upon  the  seats  I  saw  four  and  twenty  elders  sit- 
ting, clothed  in  white  raiment;  and  they  had  on  their 
heads  crowns  of  gold." 

One  may  make  a  shrewd  guess  that  the  wish  to  wear 
black  was  not  at  one  time  in  the  history  of  the  world 
that  of  a  normal,  untutored,  unthinking,  spontaneous 
human  being;  it  has  always  come  from  some  associated 
idea,  some  convention,  custom  or  belief.  And  con- 
355 


SLfttle  Essays  in  ^Literature  an&  Xife 

trariwise,  the  Mark  Twain  feeling  for  white  raiment 
is  the  instinct  for  health  and  happiness.  The  human 
race  would  have  been  gladder  and  further  along  the 
long  path  which  begins  in  a  wriggle  in  the  mud  and 
ends  in  loftiest  righteousness,  if  only  it  had  stuck  closer 
to  this  will  to  express  externally  and  in  person  the 
good  cheer  which  is  so  necessary  a  viaticum  for  the 
journey.  But  in  stepped  convention,  and  we  dressed 
a  part  which  we  felt  called  upon  to  play  contrary  to 
all  our  feelings;  soon  this  was  frozen  into  a  habit  and 
seemed  almost  like  a  law  of  nature.  It  will  take  cen- 
turies yet  before  the  world  in  general  sees  how  sensible 
was  the  creator  of  "  Huckleberry  Finn "  when  he 
dared  to  be  himself,  to  follow,  at  the  expense  of  cus- 
tom, a  feeling  rooted  in  a  need  of  his  nature,  and  in 
the  nature  of  us  all.  A  close  study  of  Samuel 
Clemens  will  reveal  that  other  of  his  so-called  vagaries 
had  the  same  commonsensible  origin.  He  would  not 
have  been  the  great  humorist  he  was,  and  is,  had  there 
not  been  beneath  his  fun  a  fundament  of  shrewd,  sweet, 
homely  wisdom.  After  all,  it  takes  a  very  wise  man 
to  show  us  the  humor  that  is  to  be  found  in  life. 


THE   END 


356 


THE  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 
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